Human, All Too Human
by Kitarra
Summary: News of Jade has reached the DomZ hivequeen, who is determined to capture her by any means necessary. Jade & Double H work to eradicate the DomZ remaining on Hillys, but a corrupt reporter & an insider with a deadly grudge threaten to destroy IRIS forever
1. Prologue: A Message is Received

Hi everybody. Welcome to my story. I am a new writer, so of course reviews are appreciated; I thrive on compliments and criticism alike!

Time for the "well, duh" bit: I own nothing, these characters are not my own. Nor am I looking to make any money; I'm just trying to satisfy my own burning desire for a sequel to the best game EVAR by writing one myself. See what you've driven me to, Ubisoft! Damn you! ...Mr. Ancel, let's talk. You don't really need them. You write us the rest of the trilogy, and I'll act it out with puppets, how does that sound? Good? Good. Hey, what's with the bodyguards with tazers? _...Oh god no! Mon dieu!  
_

Some quick background info: This story takes place after the final battle in the videogame _Beyond Good and Evil_. Our lovely protagonist and companions have returned to Hillys, and starting with Chapter 1 we'll be getting back to them. But before they even leave Selene, the DomZ priest's dying thoughts are relayed across the overwhelming vastness of space...

* * *

**Prologue  
A Message is Received**

Knowledge streamed across the ether, following millions of infinitesimal puckers in the fabric of space to travel much faster than mere clumsy light. Invisible to the eye, undetectable by instrument, the stream of information had no mass and yet held the fate of a people in the balance. Within the span of several deep breaths, the awareness had reached its destination, over eight systems away.

The DomZ queen's body was designed for two purposes alone: to create progeny, and to control them. She was capable of sending and receiving millions of commands and communications every second. Hers had been a disorienting mind to conquer, and adjusting to the overwhelming amount of information transferring to and from it had been more challenging yet. But the queen's body was perfect for Its purpose, and twenty years since the most recent lead, the grueling wait had finally come to an end.

The last memories of the priest in control of the Hillyan invasion contained the information It had been seeking for hundreds of miserable years. She was there; Shauni, the source of Its power, the instrument of Its strength. She had destroyed the worthless priest – what a pitiful vessel through which to act! – but she was still weak, vulnerable...and finally within grasp. Her pathetic guardian hadn't even told her what she was. This interminable exile in this repulsive body, on this stinking planet, was finally coming to an end.

"Hillys." The word came awkwardly from the queen's mouth; the syllables were difficult to form, the borrowed tongue ill-shaped for human language. Her more versatile relay nodes transmitted in triumphant unison: "_We have located our prey. Regroup the armada – it is time to claim what is ours!_"

How many years, how many centuries since they'd torn her away? How long had it been, since the full force of Its powers had been under Its command? But It had found her again. Its prey had been run aground, and soon the chase would be over. Yes, soon they would be whole again.


	2. A Storm Rolls In

_Note (8-11-2007): I'm sick of the chapters all having two conflicting numbers (Chapter 2: Chapter 1: A Storm Rolls In) because of the prologue, so I'm changing the numbers to agree with fanfiction . net's automatic numbering. In other words, yes we've just gone from the prologue to chapter 2, no you haven't missed a chapter. I apologize for any confusion!_

And we're off! This chapter is a bit slow – it's reserved mostly for exposition; the characters are reintroduced, the post-battle Hillys setting is fleshed out a bit, you know the drill. But don't you fret. Thrillin' heroics are just around the corner.

* * *

**Chapter 2  
A Storm Rolls In**

Sitting out by the bilaoberry tree at dawn, it was easy to believe that the past month had been a fever-dream. The world came back to life around her as the first hint of sun broke above an island, sending rays of light cavorting over the sea's surface. The gulls began to stir, calling out and wheeling in graceful spirals through the still dawn air. In deference to the sun's approach, the stars faded; the brilliant blue luciles followed suit, their bioluminescence giving way to the day's light. It was not difficult, in the halcyon of this early morning Eden, to imagine that the DomZ invasion itself was nothing but a story and that peace had reigned unbroken on Hillys since time began.

Completing the graceful movements of the Sun Meditation, Jade let her arms fall to her lap and basked in the subtle warmth of the light. The tang of the sea air filled her senses, the sounds of the world wakening broke over her in waves. For a moment, she felt a sense of rightness that she hadn't felt in months.

A sudden sense of deja-vu jolted her out of the trance, and for a second she glanced up at the sky, half expecting it to shatter open in an ominous green spiral. Her eyes found only the morning sky of Hillys, but the magic of the moment was lost.

The tension that had been temporarily banished from her body by the meditation flooded back, every muscle tautening with stress as she returned to the lighthouse – what was left of it. In the two days since returning from Selene, she and Double H had been laboring to make the ruins inhabitable until the lighthouse could be rebuilt. The other members of the Canal City IRIS cell had promised their help, but they had all been drawn into more pressing matters.

Their cell of IRIS had been communicating with the rest of the network by secretly piggybacking radio signals through the Alpha Section's satellite. Once its auto-destruct had activated, they had been completely cut off from the rest of the network. Nino, Hahn, and Pey'j were struggling to combine their knowledge to get a replacement up and running. Meanwhile, Meï had withdrawn into full-on research mode, looking for any information she could find about a Domz being called Shauni.

Jade hadn't understood at first why they couldn't contact the IRIS network through official channels. She had been shocked when Hahn had explained: the people of Hillys were still dubious of IRIS's role in the war. Rumors were thick that IRIS had been a part of it the whole time, setting the people of Hillys up for the DomZs' ambush, and that it had only been a fluke that the trap had failed. Many had died in that confrontation, and those left living with the burden of survivor's guilt were confused, hurt, and looking for a scapegoat. After hearing some of the more vitriolic rumblings, Jade had quickly agreed to lay low.

Between repairing the lighthouse and searching for her kids' parents among the survivors from the Great Crypt, Jade was managing to keep herself busy enough during the day not to have the time to ask the questions that kept her from sleep at night.

The calm morning had given way by afternoon to stiff winds and ominous clouds amassing on the horizon. The smell of ozone was gathering in the air, and Jade was resigning herself to the notion that she and Double H would have to call it a day and string up tarps to keep the coming rain from causing too much damage. _Not that we're making any real progress anyways_, she thought cynically, surveying their progress with a critical eye. Neither of them had ever done much construction, and without guidance or experience, the work was slow and extremely frustrating.

"Bloody blistering barnacles!" a familiar voice exclaimed in what two days ago Jade would have thought of as an uncharacteristic oath. She turned, hiding her amusement, and gave Double H a mock-disapproving look.

Sucking on a very red and about to be swollen thumb, he looked chastised at her gaze. "I beg your pardon, Miss Jade," he said apologetically. He cautiously retrieved the hammer from where he had dropped it in haste, and returned to pounding in the nail – well, tapping it in gingerly. "This is not the kind of hammer to which I am accustomed." Glancing disgustedly at the bruises on his hands, he added, "Although, I am gaining a new empathy for my opponents through it's use."

Unable to maintain her stern facade, Jade cracked a grin. "I doubt I'm any better," she admitted, casting a gimlet eye on their sad attempts so far. "Hopefully the others will figure out how to fix up their transmitter thingummey soon so that they can help us out." A distant rumble of thunder provided them with an excuse to rest their sore thumbs safely away from hammers for a while. "C'mon, Double H, let's get the tarps up before this whole place gets an unscheduled washing."

Later, sipping hot cocoa as the rain beat out hypnotizing rhythms on the tarps overhead, Jade watched Double H act out sanitized and glorified stories of his exploits for the children, and reflected on just how much their lives had changed in the past few days.

_He's amazingly good with the kids,_ she realised, then wondered why that surprised her. How often did he interact with children, before? A surprising thought hit her – he could well be a father, at that. She knew that he lived alone in a loft downtown, but she had never seen the apartment, had no knowledge of what family he might have somewhere. Truthfully, she knew almost nothing of his life. _And yet for all that, I trust him more than Pey'j_. The thought arose unbidden to her mind, and it took her by such surprise that she nearly dropped her mug.

Double H and the kids turned to look at her – she must have made a noise. "Are you okay, Jade?" Fehn asked, concerned. "You've gone all white!"

"Oh, I'm fine," she mustered what she thought must be a terribly weak smile. "It's just a very scary story! Go on, Double H – however _did _you manage to get out of that deep-sea mismatched sockmonster's lair?" He gave her an oddly penetrating look, but continued the story, and within moments both he and the kids were completely wrapped up in the riveting (though highly improbable) narrative.

It wasn't surprising, she supposed, that she no longer trusted Pey'j. So many secrets had come to the surface in the past month; the jet boots, the Beluga, his involvement in IRIS...any of those alone, she could have forgiven. Probably even all of them together. But her trust in him failed with the knowledge that he'd had some insight into whatever the DomZ priest had been rambling about.

"_You're not who you think you are. The pig has hidden your origins from you,_" the voice of the DomZ high priest echoed in her head. Pey'j's own voice came swiftly on its heels: "_You're not the one you think you are, Jade. You've always had a prodigious energy hidden deep inside you._" And that was the closest to an explanation she had managed to get from him. Any time she tried to bring it up, he dodged the question or found some urgent errand to which he simply _had _to attend.

_I'm not who I think I am? Damn it, Pey'j! If I'm not who I think I am, it's because I've believed everything you've ever told me about my past. What in Selene's deepest crater have you been hiding from me for the past twenty years?_

Double H had reached the climax of his story, and Jade took the opportunity to slip from the common room unnoticed. Oblivious to the pouring rain, she made her way out to sit beneath the bilaoberry tree, bracing her back against it for stability.

It was out here that it had all began. This was where she had been teaching Fehn the Gull's Flight meditation when the sky erupted into chaos. But no – the more she learned, the more she realised that this crisis had begun not in the past two months, but rather two decades ago, with her birth.

_Is it because of who – or what – I am that my parents are dead?_ That was another thing that she had never gotten a satisfactory answer about from Pey'j. He was the only family that she had ever known, and even when she had asked him about her parents as a child, he had been elusive. All she knew was that they had given her to Pey'j for safekeeping, and that if they had still been alive, they would have returned for her by now.

_My god, the DomZ followed us here,_ she thought with a sudden and terrible clarity. _They came to Hillys to find me. I led them to this place. The DomZ, the Alpha Sections – all of this suffering is because of me._

Her eyes tingled as tears welled up and overflowed, the saline mixing with rainwater in rivulets down her face.

_The children – some of their parents may still be alive. But how many will grow up orphans thanks to the Alpha Sections and the DomZ? How many of them will never see their families again, because of me? God _damn_ it, Pey'j, what the bloody hump have you been keeping from me!_

Somehow triggered by this guilt and uncertainty, all of the pent-up fear, anger, desolation and pain she had experienced in the past month now boiled to the surface. Focused on maintaining her composure so that she could get the job done, she had bottled it all up inside. There it had fermented, and now the pressure behind it was overwhelming. Her tears gave way to body-wracking sobs; soon she was crying as she hadn't since childhood. She wept until her body had no more tears to shed, and then she sobbed some more, eyes straining with the effort to expel tears that would not come. She beat her fists against the ground in a fruitless show of desperation and frustration, tearing hunks of grass from the waterlogged soil and skinning her knuckles against the roots of the tree.

Finally she had exhausted her energy, and she simply sat in the rain, trying to regain control of her breath and of her thoughts. As the raw emotion began to dissipate, she became aware of a familiar figure lurking exactly the proper distance away.

"How much of that little tantrum did you catch?" she tried to make it sound like a joke, but it came out flat and toneless. Accepting the invitation, Double H approached her. "I imagine you'd gotten it mostly out by the time I got here," he said honestly. "Although I haven't the foggiest what the grass might have done to deserve such treatment," he added with a small smile that rapidly turned into a guilty grimace as her face crumpled in the threat of renewed weeping.

"No, no, it was only a joke...Jade, you're bleeding!" he exclaimed, catching one of her mangled hands in his.

"It doesn't matter," she choked, struggling to regain control again. He must think her a complete moron, crying in the rain and beating up the turf.

He sat there for a moment, clearly not knowing what to do. He started towards her once but stopped himself. Dropping her hand abruptly, he rose and looked practically at the sky, which was crackling with energy from the storm. "Come now, Miss Jade," he said finally. "It is awfully risky to be underneath such a tall tree in an electrical storm. We must get inside to clean up your hands. It's highly practical to ward off infection." He offered her a hand up, and she took it without thinking. Together they headed back to the lighthouse which, ramshackle as it was, still offered shelter and familiarity.

- - -

By the time Hub had returned to the lighthouse with Jade, the kids had managed to get the government-issued tents pitched in the area outside the front door where a few strategically strung tarps protected them from the brunt of the storm. A couple of the tents looked somewhat creatively assembled, but his experienced eye told him that they would stand 'til morning. He had managed to convince Jade to go to bed, promising to watch over the children himself until Pey'j returned for the night. He was glad, though a bit surprised, at how easy it had been to convince her to take the small bed on the first floor of the lighthouse. The children soon grew too weary to continue their nightly shenanigans, and after tucking them all in he grabbed a sturdy wooden chair and sat down to wait for Pey'j to return. 

Alone with his thoughts he couldn't stop berating himself for his inability to comfort Jade after her breakdown. Highly practical? _Highly practical! _When had he become such a robot? His partner – no, his _friend_, damn it – didn't need to be told about the wisdom of cleaning muddy cuts. She needed...what? A shoulder to cry on? Some reassuring words? He sighed deeply, thoroughly disgusted with himself. He didn't even know. It wasn't exactly a situation that military training had covered.

He had run away from home at fifteen to join up during the Thaïr Campaign. He'd been big for his age, and the recruitment officer had believed his story and taken him on. Young and impressionable, he had absorbed the Carlson and Peeters way of life completely. He had been not only eager but bright as well, and he had been earmarked from the start as officer potential. He started climbing the ranks almost immediately. He had been a good soldier – a _fantastic_ soldier.

It had been several years before he began to admit that the military wasn't just about protecting the weak and saving those in peril, and several more yet before he could believe the evidence that there was rampant corruption throughout the military. But when the DomZ had arrived, the shine was back on the apple. At last, he was doing good again – this was the real thing! A vicious alien threat that was strange, insatiable and cruel, from which he must protect the helpless Populus. But swift on their heels had been the Alphas.

At first everyone, citizen or soldier alike, had been relieved to receive help from the gallant Alpha Sections. As the Hillyan army was given over to more and more of their command, however, Hub had become even more jaded and suspicious than before. He started to question some of his orders, first privately and then more vocally. Soon he began to "improvise" on missions, taking the wisest course of action rather than what he had been ordered to do. Before he knew it he was stalled as a sergeant in a remote sector, stuck with only the most menial of tasks. Shortly thereafter he had been recruited by IRIS and had defected from the army to begin searching for the truth. He was no longer a soldier but a spy and a warrior, and those three professions were the only ones he had ever known.

He glanced up self-consciously at the area that he and Jade had been working on earlier that day. So far, without a war to fight he was a fish out of water. Carpenter he was not, and IRIS would not have any jobs for him until they could contact the rest of the network. He had no marketable skills outside of combat and infiltration, and he could never bring himself to return to the military. He'd been a free agent too long – to return to the chaffing yoke of authority would destroy any sense of purpose he could gain by reenlisting.

He'd been fighting in campaigns, "peace actions," or wars for over two decades. This war in particular had been his life's mission for the past nine years. Now, everything that he had ever fought for he had either rejected or achieved. What was left for him to do? He was thirty-six now, he realized with a start. His birthday had come and gone a few weeks ago without him even noticing. Too old to start life over, too young to retire. He had no family left, no real friends outside of his IRIS comrades...and Jade.

He sighed deeply and let his head fall back against the stone wall of the lighthouse. Jade. That girl was special. He had never met anyone else that cared so deeply for the world around them. He didn't care what the DomZ high priest had said – there was simply no way that a being so kind could be harboring evil. Now if only he could somehow convince her of that.

He snuck a glance towards her sleeping face, and found himself incapable of looking away. _She's beautiful_, he mused, and quickly jerked his eyes away as his own face turned crimson. _...and technically young enough to be my daughter,_ he appended, resolutely derailing that particular train of thought.

His brain searched for a safe subject, and latched on to the question of when Pey'j would return. The weather was rough enough that he might not have been able to find a ride home. Not for the first time, Hub questioned why Pey'j was spending so much time away from the lighthouse since their return. Obviously he was working on a way to get radio communications back up, but Nino was quite capable of that himself. Besides, it was obvious that Jade needed him here. She had more questions than there were waves on the sea, and Pey'j was the only one that could answer them – if he even knew the answers himself.

For the thousandth time, Hub wondered why the pig had hidden so much from Jade. Perhaps he had done it to protect her, but if that was the case, he couldn't have failed more miserably. _Knowing the threat is half of the battle_, he quoted sleepily. _Carlson and Peeters, page...three hundred and...something._

His breathing grew slower as he joined the rest in slumber. Around them, the storm raged, transforming both sky and sea into impassable things. Without the shield yet functional, they could not have asked for a better guard against unwelcome visitors, and the night marched on without event.

- - -

Across the turbulent water, in the Akuda Bar, Pey'j slammed down the phone in frustration. "Canal City Cab ain't takin' people out of downtown tonight either," he scoffed. "What a bunch a' nellies! It ain't but a bit of rain." 

"Don't worry, chief. The storm will keep them safe enough – if the cabs aren't going out in this, no vorax will be either," Meï reasoned soothingly.

"You look tired, sir," Nino added. "Why don't you take a room here and call it a night? I'll fly you over to the lighthouse myself first thing in the morning." Recognizing common sense when he heard it, Pey'j had grumpily consented. He was in bed soon after, but sleep did not come easy.

Hahn, Nino, Meï, and especially that Double H...he could see it in all their faces: the question of why he hadn't told her anything before. Sometimes, he wondered the same thing._ It would be easier if I knew more myself_, he thought angrily. The knowledge that he did have was vague and incomplete.

_And it frightens you_, a corner of his mind whispered relentlessly. _You agreed to take it away, to throw the DomZ off its scent. But it grew up, didn't it? It became your little girl. You haven't told her a thing because you've been trying to forget it yourself. To speak it aloud would make it real, and you just want for her to live a happy, normal life._

He rolled over and stuck his head forcibly under the pillow, trying to block out the stream of thought. But it was true, and he couldn't deny it. He had signed on to the project for the greater good, to hide her away for the safety of the universe. But somewhere along the way Jade herself had become the most important piece of the universe to protect. She was his life's work, and he could be rightly proud of her – she had spunk, sass, brains and know-how, talent, guts, and the wisdom to know when to avoid a fight. Yes, she'd done him proud. Now if only he could say the same of himself.

On the way back from Selene, suffering through the awkward silences aboard the Beluga, he had resolved to tell her most of what he knew. Carrying out the resolution had proved to be more difficult than he had expected. Every time she asked, he found an excuse not to tell her. Whenever he opened his mouth to begin, some inane joke would come out instead. And then Meï had announced that she would be researching to see what she could find, and he had started to hope that she would find enough so that the scraps of information he did know could be transformed into something whole and sensible.

Of course, he could just be telling himself that to have an excuse to put it off longer. It was hard to tell. Either way, he _did_ want her to know...he just wanted her to know the whole story, not just the dribbles of fact that he had now. No, it made more sense to wait.

Guilt successfully bypassed for the night, he rolled over and soon found the refuge of sleep.


	3. Things that go Click in the Dark

...in which _thrilling heroics ensue!_ Oh yeah. I know I have a less direct & action-packed way of writing than most of the fic writers here, but hopefully it's still engaging enough that people are reading and enjoying it.

_Nota bene_: I made a point in this installation of putting both of Pey'j's hands in full view at once. That doesn't mean that I am denying the cliffhanger ending of Our Moste Holy Canon; it just hasn't happened yet.

Also: there is little that's more annoying than the spell-checker when it hits a patch of Pey'j's dialog. It's like trying to have a conversation with one of those people who nit-picks your grammar every time you try to take a little artistic license with your phraseology. Boo.

Also also: hummercraft. Ha ha, I so witty.

* * *

**Chapter 3  
Things That Go Click In The Dark**

The faint light of pre-dawn filtered through the tiny circular window, stirring Jade slowly into wakefulness. Her dreams slowly lost their surreal, fantastic quality as her conscious mind began imposing its will on them. Eventually she succumbed to the inevitable and let the dreamworld go, opening her eyes to a new day. It was still raining, but the storm had blown itself out in the night. Her hands throbbed with a slight, dull ache and she looked down at them in surprise. She hadn't realised last night how badly she'd cut them up in her outburst. Double H had cleaned them off and bandaged them up with a startlingly gentle touch; somehow, he had even managed to keep the disinfectant from stinging too badly, but then, he would know a bit about field dressings.

The toy airplane above her head spun lazily in circles, its little carved pilot seemingly steering it in an eternal holding pattern over the bed. Outside, the first gulls of the day were carrying out the same dizzying maneuver, wheeling in continuous spirals in search of food. Off in Jade's peripheral vision, something was pulsing with an insistant red light. Turning her attention to her surroundings, Jade discovered the source of the intrusive blinking was her SAC's visual message alert. Reluctantly, she rolled out of bed to check the message, dragging the warm comforter around her in defense against the cool morning air as she went.

She pressed a series of buttons to play the message, her fingers flying deftly over the control panel with the grace of constant usage. Pey'j's drawling voice surrounded her as she strapped the SAC on for the day: "_Jade, the cabs are all too scared of a little rain to get my old ass home tonight. I'm going to sleep here at Akuda and I'll find my way home in the mornin', so don't fret yerself skinny over me._"

Double H was still there, fast asleep in a wooden chair in the most uncomfortable sleeping position Jade had ever seen. She cracked a smile and gently covered him with her blanket, careful not to wake him. He'd been good to his word, staying to look after the children. They, too, were all still fast asleep. Checking briefly to make sure that their tents had stayed dry, she went back into the kitchen to find some breakfast.

The smell of pancakes worked like magic. Before the first one was through cooking, half of the kids were swarming through the kitchen. Jade passed on pancake duty to Kip as her SAC beeped with another incoming message.

"_Jade darlin', there's a change in plans. Meet me at the governor's office as soon as you can. She's got a proposition I think you'll want to hear. Bring that buckethead sidekick of yours if you can – the job's for both of you. Remember, the governor is a classy lady – you're not going to be slummin' it like with IRIS, so make sure you wash behind your ears, little miss!_"

"A sidekick now, am I?" a deep voice came from over her shoulder, still gravelly from sleep. Jade whirled around, ready to explain Pey'j's odd sense of humour, but Double H was grinning at the joke. "I think he's starting to like me. It's strange, you know, meeting the Chief after all these years. I never expected his call sign to turn out to be quite so...literal."

Jade's smile drooped a bit as she realised that in some ways, Double H actually knew more about her uncle than she did. She glanced down at her bandaged hands, and resolutely decided not to care. If she planned on letting every little reminder of Pey'j's old double life bother her, she would be throwing herself into a crochax's mouth in no time. She knew now; that would have to be enough.

"Well, let's grab some grub," she chirped, her good mood only slightly forced. "I'd hate to keep the governor waiting!"

- - -

The governor's office was a surprisingly comfortable place, for a government building. The east wall was entirely glass, and from its vantage point high up in the courthouse it overlooked a breath-taking scene of Canal City and the vast ocean beyond, peppered with tiny islets. The furnishings were all wood, polished to a radiant gleam. Bookcases lined the wall and a stately desk held court in the middle of the room. As they entered, the governor rose and came forward to meet them.

"Oh good, you both made it. It's so good to see you both again, Double H, Shauni..." the governor greeted them warmly, clasping their hands in official embrace.

"It's just Jade now," Jade interjected with a gentle smile, forcing down the font of emotions that threatened to bubble up upon hearing that name. _I reject you,_ she spared a moment to think passionately; although the DomZ high priest was dead, her thoughts of him lingered. _You cannot control me!_ The governor looked surprised for a second, but took it in stride and carried on.

Three oak chairs faced the desk, upholstered in tones that mimicked the colors of the Hillyan seascape. Pey'j was already seated in one, and now the governor gestured at the other two. "Jade, Double H, please have a seat." She waited for the duo to seat themselves, and began. "I have a proposition for you. I understand that the two of you have been working to rebuild the southern lighthouse shelter?" They nodded, and she continued, tapping a pen against the arm of her chair. "Very rewarding work, I'm sure. But I think that perhaps that is the kind of labor that could be better carried out by trained professionals; say, government contractors. Would that be agreeable to you?" Her pen stilled, as if in eager anticipation of their response.

Jade and Double H shared an amused glance. "Oh, I think we could tear ourselves away," Jade replied with humour. "But if you don't mind my asking, Madam Governor, why would you make such a generous offer?"

The governor steepled her hands, and looked at them frankly over her fingertips. "For one thing, helping to rebuild a shelter for DomZ orphans is something that I, as a person, would like to do. It would also be good for my public image, I admit. But most importantly, I need you two free to do a job for me, if you're willing."

"Go on," Jade prompted, intrigued, and the governor relaxed slightly.

"We may have driven back the DomZ, but several of their creatures have been left behind, scattered over Hillys. We've already received reports from anxious citizens, worried that the DomZ are returning. We know that's not the case," she stressed, as if convincing herself. "But, we'd like to clean up their leftovers before any more rumors start circulating." She rose and walked over to an MDisc writer and retrieved a disc from the inscription dock. "I know that you two are more than capable of the task. This disc contains a map of Hillys with the sightings marked on it, and any information we have on each occurrence. Jade, your payment would be the reconstruction of the lighthouse. Double H, if you accept, I can pull some strings with the Hillyan army. I know they have a captain position they need to fill – "

"Thank you, Madam Governor, but I must decline your offer," Double H interrupted. "I would be more than happy to take this mission, but I have no desire to return to the military. The lighthouse being rebuilt is payment enough for me as well, if Miss Jade consents." He and the governor both looked expectantly at Jade.

She, in turn, glanced at Pey'j, who had so far kept silent. The pig nodded almost imperceptibly, and Jade faced the governor again. "It's a very good offer, and I'd be happy to accept."

The governor beamed and handed her the MDisk. "Splendid! I will have a team sent over immediately to begin construction. I think you will be most impressed with their work." Her expression melted slowly into a more serious visage, and she looked away, peering out the window at the bustling city beneath them. "And Jade, Double H...I hope you will not hold it against me for not being able to say it in public, but Hillys owes you a great debt of gratitude for all of your efforts. It will not be forgotten, you have my word."

- - -

As they walked down the stately marble stairs onto the floor level of the courthouse, Jade turned to Pey'j. "Okay, you old fart. You feel like explaining why you're so keen on us taking this job?"

Pey'j ran a hand over his smooth head, a smug grin playing over his face. "It ain't so much her job I care about, it's her offer." He paused as they walked past a group of shark-men wearing suits and carrying briefcases. "Lawyers," he muttered under his breath disgustedly. "Now, you know how we've been workin' on the plans for a new transmitter?"

Jade pursed her lips. Her uncle's new habit of changing the subject whenever she asked him a question was getting to be intolerable. "Pey'j, don't _do _that. What are you..."

"Hold your horses, missy. I ain't said my piece yet," he interrupted as they passed through the courthouse's grand entrance into the pedestrian district. He darted a look around them, as if checking for anyone listening in on their conversation, but the streets were almost deserted at the moment. "Now, we've got the plans all drawn up, but we're goin' to need to build a heckuva tower. Three, four stories high, at least. And it's goin' to be rough explainin' why the old Akuda Bar is sportin' a shiny new radio tower."

Double H whistled quietly through his teeth. "Aha! I see, sir. Very clever indeed!"

Jade frowned, frustrated. She was clearly missing something. "But how do we..."

The smirk on Pey'j's face broke into a full grin. "Piece of cake, little lady. You do this milk run for the governor, and while you're off foolin' around, we'll have a beauty of a radio tower erected for us, and all on the government's dime!"

Understanding flooded into Jade's face. "Oh, hiding the transmitter in the lighthouse. You're right, that _is_ genius. But how will you get it installed without the contractors noticing?"

"That part's a surprise. You just leave that to your ol' uncle Pey'j. Now, why don't you drop me off at the lighthouse, and I'll let you git on yer way."

The Governor had been as good as her word; by the time they returned to the lighthouse, a handful of people were unloading equipment from a hummercraft reading "Hillys Construction Co." One of the workers in particular caught Jade's eye; wearing tan heavy-duty overalls and a red bandana, he looked just like...

"Nino?" she thought out loud, confused. "But how did he...I'm still missing something."

"Well Miss Jade, most people in IRIS have jobs outside the network," Double H began.

"Meï is one of them librarian types, Hahn is a taxi driver, Peepers runs the bar, you're a freelance photographer and tin can here is a..." he stopped abruptly and looked at Double H quizzically. "Well actually, I haven't the foggiest what it is you do with your spare time. But Nino there works for his father's construction company, which just so happens to pick up most of the Canal City government contracts in this sector."

Jade grinned at the brazenness of the plan. "I see. Very sneaky, Uncle Pey'j. It's just...odd, somehow, thinking of everyone leading normal lives on the side. I mean, Hahn is a _taxi driver?_" she elaborated in disbelief. "I know so little about them all!"

"Well, our chapter of IRIS is awful sloppy," Pey'j said with a frown. "In most cells, members know each other only by code names, and if they should meet one another accidentally in the real world they never mention it. I tried for a while to enforce that sort of thing here, but these Hillyans are just too damn' trustin'. And now my identity's a bust too, so I better hope that they're some awfully trustworthy folk. Just don't go and blow his cover now, little miss."

"Of course," Jade agreed automatically, her mind boggling at the notion that for all of their cell's secrecy measures, Pey'j still considered them "sloppy" with security. She couldn't imagine not trusting her friends in IRIS enough to associate with them outside of the hideout. Abruptly, she was aware that there were now several people who could ruin her life with a single slip of the tongue, and she became much more understanding of the hard line that Pey'j had taken to keep his two lives separate.

"Uncle Pey'j..." she began, not quite knowing what she was trying to say.

"What is it, darlin'?"

"...nothing. Only, well, be careful," she finished clumsily, giving him a brief hug.

"Always am, little lady. You watch your back out there too, y'hear?" he said gruffly, clutching one of her bandaged hands in both of his.

- - -

"There," Double H shouted above the buzz of the speedcraft engine. "The first sighting was in that cave, just ahead!"

Jade eased off the throttle, and the craft drifted gently into the cave's mouth. She picked a good spot and piloted the craft masterfully in. They hopped out and looked around warily, looking for anything out of place.

"Did the disc say anything else?" Jade inquired, pulling out her camera. As Double H called up the file on his SAC, she snapped a few pictures of the cave and, surreptitiously, a candid shot of him.

Oblivious, Double H shook his head. "Very little to go on. Two weeks ago a fisherman came in to check his schkulpa traps and reportedly saw a large, ominous creature. That's all there is."

"All right, let's go find ourselves a monster!"

The cavern's first section, pockmarked with dozens of little tide pools, was perfect for schkulpa beds. Jade took a few pictures of the tasty and brightly colored little crustaceans in case the natural history museum would still be interested. The cavern was punctuated liberally with stalactites and stalagmites, the walls streaked alternately with subdued whites and blues and brilliant oranges. Smears of phosphorescent fungus gave the entire area a surreal glow, lending it an eerie feel but making it navigable without lanterns. It was difficult to pick a path through the maze of protrusions, and there were numerous dead ends. After the first few wrong turns, Jade called a halt.

"Hold on, Double H. I don't think I want to go any further into this labyrinth without a thread to guide us back out. Secundo!"

"Ever your faithful friend, Secundo is at your service _mia bella!_" Secundo intoned as he materialized from her SAC's hologram projector.

"I need you to keep track of our turns and analyze our progress, Secundo. I'm not going to be able to remember all of these dead ends, and I don't want to get trapped in this maze for the next decade."

"But of course, _señorita_. Secundo _el magnificio_ will be taking care of it. You no needing to be worrying your head about it any more!"

"A sound plan, Miss Jade," Double H approved. "I was beginning to feel a bit claustrophobic myself."

Their exit route ensured, they continued their descent. The further they got from the surface, the more alien the environment became. Strange funguses and lichens that Jade had never seen before dotted the cave's walls, and as they entered a new bulbous tunnel system, little bobbing lights began to appear. Similar to luciles in appearance but glowing a sickly green-yellow, there was something unsettling about them. Jade snapped a picture and muttered, "Corpse-lights. Little bioluminescent insects that feed on the flesh of the dead...I thought they were just a bedtime scare-story. I wonder what other delights we're in for?" As if in answer to her sarcastic utterance, a nauseating odor wafted up from the murky depths. "Ugh," she grunted in disgust. "What _is_ that?"

Double H wrinkled his nose. "I believe _that _is the smell of rotting flesh," he intimated, a sense of increased awareness settling about him. "The better for your little friends here to feed on. We had better be carefuuUAAAGH!" His warning was cut of unceremoniously as a handful of the corpse-lights darted suddenly towards him. As they grew closer, it became clear that they were attached to one another by a tentacle, which in turn was attached to...something.

"GRLBurghaaAGH!" he gargled, the tentacle wrapping around his neck, a bulbous body hanging from it near his navel. He grabbed the thing attached to the tendril and tried to pull it off, but every tug only tightened its grip on his throat.

Jade instantly pulled out her Daï-jo, but because of how the thing was dangling she couldn't get a clean line to swing at it without also hitting Double H. She tried a few jabs, but with nothing but air behind the creature, she was only swinging it around rather than actually causing damage. She stepped back and aimed her gyro-disc launcher, but it was thrashing so wildly that none of her shots connected.

As she ruled out the possibility of charging her Daï-jo and bombarding it with projectiles for the fear of hitting her friend, she realised that she was running out of time – Double H was beginning to turn an alarming shade of purple and was staggering as if drunk. Longing for a knife with which to sever the thing's deadly gripping tentacles she ran through a million stupid ideas in her head, finally latching onto one that seemed slightly less far-fetched than the rest.

"Double H, hit the deck!" she yelled urgently. He complied with a weak gurgle and the body of the creature smacked against solid ground with a wet thump. Jade smashed the thing repeatedly and brutally until it detached its tentacles and writhed in pain, uttering a terrible squeal. It convulsed once, dramatically, and ceased its keening.

Double H rubbed his Adam's apple gingerly, a rueful grimace on his face. "_Thank _you, Miss Jade," he choked out fervently. "That is without a doubt the least attractive thing I ever hope to have sucking my neck!" Jade snorted, and pulled an electric lantern out from her SAC. She aimed it at the other corpse-lights, but no other tentacled things were revealed. Satisfied, she shone it next at the carcass of the thing that had attacked Double H, and could not control the horrified squeak that escaped her. Double H made no noise, but turned slightly green and put his hands protectively to his throat.

The thing was a shade of greenish-grey that looked more than slightly rotten. Its bulk was made up mainly by what, for lack of a better term, might loosely be described as a head. In reality it seemed more like a staging point that existed only to provide a place for its rows and rows of wickedly jagged teeth. Punctuating the "head" were two clusters of several bulging, milky eyes without pupils, the color and shape of maggots. It then tapered down to two legs in the back, articulated for quick movement and long leaps. There were two smaller legs in the front for balance and, judging by the cruel-looking hooked claws, attack.

Protruding from the hideous face was a single, fronded tentacle. This disgusting appendage was dotted every few centimeters with a sucker cup, and each tendril was tipped with an orb that glowed the same vomitous yellow-green as the corpse-lights. As they watched in shocked horror the thing twitched suddenly, its jaws clacked in a brief spasm, and then it laid still, the orbs fading before their eyes.

"Camouflage," Double H croaked. "It mimics the corpse-lights. Perhaps it uses them as lures, grabs its prey, constricts, and..." he stopped, looking ill.

"What a foul beast," Jade whispered. "I had no idea there were creatures like that on Hillys." She snapped a picture with clear disgust and hastily stowed her camera again. The encounter over, they both looked hesitantly down the tunnel before them.

"Well..."

"I guess we'd better..."

"Yeah." Jade led the way at a significantly reduced pace, shining her lantern into every nook and cranny on the way. The reek grew more and more overwhelming, and it was almost intolerable when the tunnel abruptly opened up into a vast underground lake. Jade's light was too weak to reach the other side of the enormous cavern, but it did illuminate a hideous sight ten meters in, just past the water-line.

The carcass of a DomZ sea serpent lay there, partially decomposed and significantly gnawed upon, swarming in corpse-lights. Its great maw lay gaping open, revealing a giant pearl. Fighting back a wave of nausea, Jade took a few hasty steps back. "We found our monster," she croaked; "now let's get the hell out of here!"

"The pearl..."

"Do you want to get it?"

"Point taken. Back to the surface it is," Double H said with relief in his voice. As Jade turned to leave, she screamed in pure instinctive reflex as one of the tentacled beasts lunged from the shadows towards her. She jerked backwards and stumbled on the rocky tunnel floor, struggling to get at her Daï-jo as the thing skittered towards her menacingly. Not missing a beat, Double H swung his immense hammer with surprising speed, and splattered the creature with a sickening noise like a bursting water balloon. A glob of its liquid remains struck Jade's cheek with a splat, and she choked back the bile that rose in her throat.

The buzzing from the cavern ominously stopped, and both Jade and Double H looked behind them in terrible foreboding. As if on cue, the swarm of lights surged towards them with the tell-tale clicking of thousands of little claws on stone.

"Jade, _run!_" cried Double H, grabbing her arms and dragging her to her feet. She stumbled and ran blindly, flashlight dropped and forgotten. "Secundo!" she yelled. "Get us out of here!"

"Next junction, turn to you right," her SAC replied obediently. "You _other _right, Yade! It is not the time for to practicing dyslexia!"

"Jade, they're gaining on us!" Double H cried frantically. "Hurry!"

They ran with mad desperation, but the swarm of horrors drew closer and closer. Following Secundo's directions, they entered the tightest tunnel on their route, the most densely packed with precarious stalactites. Their movement slowed intolerably, and Jade realised with sick certainty that they swarm of creatures following them wouldn't be slowed by this terrain at all. She yelped as her motions broke loose a giant rock spike that nearly impaled her as it plummeted to the ground. She glanced back to make sure that Double H understood the added peril, and watched in horror as he stopped and turned, drawing his massive hammer.

"Jade, _RUN!_" he bellowed, sensing her slow.

"But – "

"_GO!_" Something in his voice made her comply. She turned and ran, legs pumping automatically.

Double H shifted his body to a fighting stance, bracing himself on muscular legs. Activating his energy shield, he watched the things approach, skittering unbelievably fast, their deadly tentacles waving before them like lewd tongues._ If this doesn't work, it's going to be a definite closed-casket funeral for me,_ he thought with the artificial calm of adrenaline.

At the last second, just as the first wave launched themselves towards him with their suckers outstretched, he swung his hammer into the wall of the tunnel with all the strength he possessed. A deadly shower of stalactites rained down, and his raised arm strained with the force of them striking his shield – but it held. The screams of dying whatever-they-weres filled his ears as he stumbled backwards, hoping against hope that he hadn't blocked himself into an early tomb.

Luck was with him. He fell back into an open space, and he lay there for a moment in mixed pride and disbelief that his asinine idea had actually worked.

His view of the cave's ceiling was suddenly replaced with huge, green, worried eyes. "Double H! Are you all right?" her voice was breathless with exertion and anxiety. He flexed his tingling fingers on his shield arm, checking subconsciously for fractures, taking deep breaths of the stale subterranean air.

"I'm A-OK, Miss Jade," he answered, "but I'll be a good sight better once we put this place behind us. Let's get back to the hovercraft." She agreed readily, helping him up. Together, they followed Secundo's directions, and when they reached the hovercraft they gratefully leapt aboard and sped away without a backwards glance.

- - -

As they bounced across the waves, the dismal rainy day as beautiful to them as any paradise, Jade watched Double H rub his aching arm.

"So what _do_ you do in your spare time?" she inquired abruptly. He looked up at her, startled.

"I beg your pardon, Miss Jade?"

"If everyone in IRIS has a day job, what's yours? How do you support yourself?" She bit her lower lip nervously, hoping she wasn't being too nosy. Double H looked out over the water, trying to word his response.

"IRIS pays its field operatives very generously, when danger is involved. The riskier the job, the greater the reward; sometimes they pay in pearls, sometimes in units. In the past nine years, I have gone on hundreds of extremely perilous missions. From several, I was never really expected to return...but someone had to try." His eyes lost their focus, as if he was trying to see something from a great distance. "I offered to take those jobs _because_ I had no ties outside of IRIS," he continued, a subtle note of regret creeping into his voice. "There was no one to leave abandoned if I did fail to return one day. I went on those missions because they needed to be done, and so that no one else would risk themselves. And now, I find my appetite for such work lost, and nothing else for me to do."

To that, Jade had no idea how to respond. A balloon of guilt filled her chest as she realised that she had practically trapped him into accepting this mission. "Double H, would you..." She stopped, trying to think of a way to say her piece without injuring his pride. "We don't have to do this job, for the governor," she suggested tentatively. Her words jolted him out of his reverie, and she saw several conflicting emotions swiftly flit across his face before he clamped his muscles into control. "If you..."

"Miss Jade, don't be ridiculous," he cut in. "That's not what I meant at all. It's my taste for solitude that's turned to ash, not adventure – I have no wish for my life to become boring!" He grinned at her winningly, and pulled out the map. "Now then, where is our next target?"

They sped on across the sea, headed for the next mark. Out of the corner of his eye, Hub saw her regarding him thoughtfully, and he knew that she wasn't completely at ease. But how could he tell her that it was the way she lived her life that made his seem so barren in comparison? He wanted nothing more than to become a part of her life, to walk out of the shadows of his own world and into the sun-drenched beauty of hers. No, it would sound like the ravings of a madman. And they sailed on in silence, each wondering what words were left unspoken between them.


	4. Secrets

This one is a little more rough than I'd like, but I'm on a roadtrip at the moment with limited access to computers/internet, so I haven't had much time to revise. At the moment, I've been on the road for four days and completely exhausted, so my witty banter is a little lackluster as well. :-P This coming week is likely to be similiar -- Chapter 4 may be a little short, but then I should be back to normal. Woo hoo!

Chapter 3! Now with PLOT!

Without further ado...

* * *

**Chapter 4  
Secrets**

Nino and Pey'j were still up in the lighthouse working on the transmitter when Jade got home. Pey'j heard the hovercraft pull in, and he glanced out of the partially-rebuilt window and waited. When he saw her emerge from the entrance to the hangar, he breathed an audible sigh of relief. Nino looked over and cocked his head quizzically.

"You worry, when she's out on a mission?" he asked, mumbling slightly around the wires in his mouth.

Pey'j looked away from the window, and regarded Nino frankly. "I sure do, kid. She's damn special, that one, and the notion of her bein' in harm's way is enough to give me an ulcer."

Nino looked a bit startled. "Didn't you set this job with the governor up for her in the first place?" he pressed, trying to make sense of the situation.

Pey'j sighed deeply, and focused intently on the wire he was soldering. "Well," he grunted, "I said I worried about her, kid, not that I was hare-brained enough to think for a second that I could keep her outta danger entirely. With a gal like Jade, you tell her not to stick her finger in the socket, and the second you're not lookin' she's stickin' her whole fist in there."

Nino cracked a slight grin at the comparison, and went back to his work. After a while, he broke the silence abruptly. "I do, to," he said. "Worry about her, I mean." Pey'j looked at him sharply.

"Do you now." Aside from that time last week Peepers had unwittingly gotten Nino prattling on about his current favorite band, this was the longest non-IRIS-related conversation Pey'j had ever seen the boy engage in. Not big on words, this one.

"Yeah," Nino continued. "There's just something about her..." he shot a quick, bashful look at his chief. "It makes you want to protect her, like."

Pey'j snorted. "Easy there, Galahad. She ain't exactly the kind that takes well to bein' coddled."

Nino blushed slightly, and without thinking blurted out the question that had been bothering him for weeks: "Are you really her uncle?" As soon as the words were out of his mouth, he regretted them, and looked a bit embarrassed. Pey'j kept silent for a moment, and then his face split into a grin.

"What, you don't see the strikin' family resemblance? Although I admit it's a little harder to see after we shelled out a bushel of pearls on her nose job," he joked, and Nino looked amused and relieved. Pey'j was also relieved when it appeared that Nino was going to let the subject drop.

A few minutes later, the object of their conversation poked her head into the room. "Hey, Nino," she greeted him, and turned to Pey'j. "Uncle Pey'j, if you don't need me for anything, I'm going straight to bed – I'm wiped," she admitted, and she did look tired.

"Of course, darlin'," Pey'j responded. "We won't be keepin' you up – we're just finishing up for the night." He set down the soldering iron, as if to prove his word.

"Hey, don't stop because of me," Jade protested. She swept her hair back, out of her face, and leaned against the doorway as if for support. "I could sleep through a hurricane tonight."

Pey'j grunted as he stood up. "Don't flatter yourself, little lady," he joked with her. "It ain't nohow on your account. I'm gettin' too old to be up this late, that's all."

Jade grinned at him cheekily. "Mmmm, aged pork, cured in the briny sea air. You must be getting tasty in your old age, Uncle Pey'j!" Pey'j swatted at her affectionately, and she winked at Nino, as if letting him in on their inside joke. "Good night," she called over her shoulder, and headed off to bed.

Pey'j looked over at Nino in time to catch him watch her go with a little more interest than a guardian likes to see taken in his ward's backside. He cleared his throat loudly, and Nino had the grace to look embarrassed. _So the kid's got a crush, _Pey'j thought idly. _I wonder if Jade has a clue?_ "Let's get this mess cleaned up," he said aloud, and they proceeded to do just that.

- - -

Nino packed the last of the equipment into the hummercraft, and swore quietly as he noticed that the welder was missing. He must have left it up on the second floor. Not wanting to wake anyone, he let himself back into the lighthouse, and walked as quietly as he could through the sleeping forms of children.

He heard a slight moan, and looked over to see Jade shift in her sleep. Her brow was furrowed a bit, her lips pressed together, and she was devastatingly beautiful in the thin shaft of moonlight that broke through the little circular window above the bed. He stood watching her, transfixed. Ever since he had first seen her walk down the stairs into the IRIS den, he'd been a little bit smitten.

Typically, he was more than happy to leave the derring-do to the muscle-bound field agents, but right now he felt a stab of envy towards Double H. While Nino was stuck here slaving away at the transmitter-receiver, the big lug was off running around with Jade, protecting her from harm. Suddenly, Nino thought of the concern in Jade's eyes when Double H had been infected by the DomZ, or the way she'd asked for his opinion before agreeing to go to Selene, and of all the time that the two of them spent together on missions. Nino had always looked up to Double H, but right now he'd gladly see the other man shipped off to Yoduro to start up a new IRIS cell there.

She rolled over in her sleep, dragging the blanket with her, revealing just enough skin above the waistband of her pajamas to rivet his attention completely. She looked so vulnerable, so helpless. He didn't care what the pig said; she needed help. Working for IRIS was dangerous as hell, and she never should have gotten involved. With the Alpha Sections fended off, there wasn't even really a need for her anymore. No, she didn't belong in IRIS.

One of the kids snored loudly, and Nino jumped self-consciously. The welder, he remembered – he'd better just get that and go. He slipped up the ramp silently and found the piece of equipment straight away. Careful not to make a noise, he closed the case around it and hoisted it up. As he turned to descend, he noticed that the lights in the bathroom had been left on, and walked over to turn them off.

To Nino's shock, Pey'j was standing in the bathroom. The pig's back was to him, and he was making sounds of discomfort. "Oh, sorry," Nino mumbled, and Pey'j spun around, revealing an empty syringe in his right hand and a trickle of blood issuing from his left inner elbow.

"What do you want?" Pey'j snarled, his face contorted with pain. Nino took a step back, unable to avert his eyes from the blood welling up on Pey'j's arm, and held up his free hand.

"Easy, chief – I had to come back for the welder." Nino paused, caught between his desire to leave the situation and concern for his chief. "Are you...are you okay, sir?"

"I'm fine," Pey'j snapped. "It just hurts like fromax to inject my...heart medication."

"Heart medication? Chief, do you need help?" Nino pressed, becoming increasingly worried.

"I'm _fine,_" the pig repeated irritably, but his face was drawn, and he was shaking slightly.

"Chief, you look like warmed over crochax droppings," Nino said bluntly. "I think you'd better sit down."

"Look here, kid. In the past few weeks I got captured, beaten, shipped to the moon in a barrel, tortured, killed, and brought back to life. You go through all that and come out the other end in one piece, and you're gonna look a bit like crap too. I'm old and tough, and I'll be just fine. You're still a kid, and you're up way past yer bedtime. Go home!"

Sensing there was no more he could do, Nino mumbled an apology and turned to leave. Pey'j's voice followed him down the ramp: "And don't you dare bother Jade about this! She's got enough to worry about without you addin' to her troubles, boy."

- - -

Peepers lit his pipe, sucking in the aromatic smoke in a leisurely fashion. This was his favorite time of night. The bar had closed, the bartender had left for the night, and he was alone in the building, turly the master of his domain. He had originally bought the bar merely as a front for the IRIS operation, and he had been pleasantly surprised when the place had actually turned a profit. Admittedly, that probably had more to do with his own skill at slight-of-hand than Mo's talent at mixing drinks, but if the suckers wanted to keep on throwing their money at him, that was no fault of his own. 

He ran his thumb over the smooth surface of his small pearl lovingly; he'd had several, over the years, but this one was lucky. On the small bets he let people keep track of it, and they gained confidence after a few wins, but it was a rare person indeed that could keep up when he played for keeps. Jade was one of them – that kid had the gift. Some people called it the sight, others said it was just good instincts or intuition; but to Peepers, superstitious and knowing little of vision, it was simply the gift. And whatever it was, she was brimming over with it.

As Peepers left, running his fingers against the wall as he went, he noticed that the door to room three was ajar. That was odd. He frowned, and decided he'd better check the IRIS den to make sure that nothing was amiss – just because they hadn't had a security breach yet didn't mean that they wouldn't. He made his way over to the revolving locker, nudged it open slightly, and held one of his sensitive ears up to the crack. He heard voices, but recognized them immediately as Hahn and Meï, and was about to leave when he heard his own name.

"Look, Hahn, I _know _she's done some incredible work, but I still wish Peepers had never found the damn girl. She's trouble." Meï's voice was passionate, and Peepers was taken aback. He wasn't sure he'd ever heard Meï badmouth anyone before. She was their den mother; friendly to everyone, she never had a single negative thing to say about a soul.

"Meï, within a month of her first setting foot down here, we've ousted the Alpha Sections _and_ the DomZ." Hahn was speaking in a no-nonsense tone, and if he was surprised to hear Meï taking a stance against their compatriot, he wasn't showing it. "The Hillyan government is rebuilding its infrastructure, and we may still not be the most popular people around, but eventually people are going to realize that the rumors are all bull."

"But that's just it, Hahn," Meï pressed on. "Who's to say they're _not _right? Awfully convenient, wasn't it, the way that they were expecting us? We barely got out, Hahn. And when we broke down that door...god, that sight...it still makes my fur bristle!"

"So we still have some questions," Hahn waved this off dismissively. "But Meï, we have been fighting to expose the Alpha Sections for years. _Years_, Meï! And she did it in weeks, with practically no training at all. The girl is inhumanly good."

Peepers heard a sharp thud. Downstairs, Meï had slammed her hand down on the holo-table in frustration. "That's just _it,_ Hahn," she persisted, getting up to pace the room. "She _isn't _human. And not just the way I'm not human, or the chief – we're still all the same, inside. But her? Who knows." She lowered her voice, as if afraid to speak the next bit out loud: "Either she _is_ DomZ, or she's being possessed by one. And I don't want her around here any more. I just don't trust her. None of us are safe, Hahn! Especially Hub – "

Here Hahn broke in with a snort. "My god, Meï, is that it?" he queried, incredulous. "Are you _still_ hung up on him? You were together for what, three months, about two years ago? Selene's craters, Meï... you're jealous of her!"

"I am not!" Meï shouted, clearly upset. "Hahn, that's ridiculous. There's nothing between us, and even if there was – "

"You _are_," Hahn interrupted, his voice tinged with amusement, sounding nothing like the man Peepers knew. "You're still in love with Double H. Fine. I hope it works out for you crazy kids." He became suddenly serious, and Peepers instantly recognised his tone of voice again. "But I will not tolerate this kind of infighting, Meï. I do understand the...unique concern that Jade poses. She is a security risk, to some degree, and we do need to determine how serious the threat it."

"It's a risk _we can't take!_ Hub's life is in her hands. He's our best operative, and yes, he's a good _friend_," she added with pointed emphasis, "and we're putting his life in danger every day, partnering him up with her. I feel sick, thinking about it – him out there alone with her, looking for the governor's monsters – she's _one_ of them, Hahn! How long before she decides to start fighting on their side again, and comes home alone with a touching story about how he died bravely in battle?"

"Meï, _enough_. You've said your piece. I understand your concern, but frankly, your personal feelings have to come in second to the cause. At this point, Jade is a vital part of our cell, and you are to do nothing – _nothing_, Meï – to jeopardize that."

"But Hahn, I – " Meï began, but he quickly cut her off.

"No. You are to obey me on this, Meï. Do you understand?" There was gravity in his voice, and an imlied threat. It took Peepers aback, and it must have made an impression on Meï.

"Yes, sir," she answered, sulky but resigned.

"Besides," Hahn added, almost as an afterthought: "you have no real need to worry. I've already begun work on a failsafe, in case she does turn out to be a threat."

Hahn's words sent a chill over Peepers, and he felt the hairs on the back of his neck prickle. He backed slowly away from the secret door, closing it soundlessly, and left the room behind. He'd heard more than he wanted to. Intrigue was not his thing – that's why he stuck to recruiting. He hated drama and politics, but he could smell talent a mile away. Which brought him back to Jade.

He liked Jade. She was a good kid, and he was not sure at all that he was comfortable with Hahn and Meï's conversation. Should he tell her? He packed his pipe, thinking it all over. Finally, he decided against it. _No, that one can take care of herself, _he thought to himself, and tried to forget about the whole unsettling incident.

- - -

Holding a small glass of Hyernan whiskey in one hand, Hub looked out of his floor-to-ceiling window over the city. His apartment was in the heart of the pedestrian district at the top of the hill on which Canal City was built, and so afforded a spectacular view. The building had once been a warehouse, when everything that went to Capitol City came through this part of Hillys. But then hovercraft technology had improved to the point that a layover point was no longer necessary here, and Canal City had gentrified into the relatively wealthy small city it was today. 

It was getting to the point that it felt strange to be out of his armor, Hub reflected, and the thought depressed him immensely. As the crusade against the Alpha Sections had heightened to a fever-pitch, he had been home less and less frequently, usually sleeping in the field on his missions. Since the return from Selene, there had been fewer days that it had made sense to wear the cumbersome stuff, and he found that it was a bit unsettling to walk around without it now.

_Not that it did me much good today,_ he thought ruefully, caressing his still-sore neck. If Jade hadn't gotten that thing off of him...the image of the needle-sharp teeth and near-blind, staring white eyes came involuntarily to his mind's eye, and he shuddered. A reference book lay on the table beside him, open to a page that helpfully identified the horrid creatures as _Anglerus Subterranus_, cave-dwelling carnivores that hunted viciously in packs of hundreds. When food was scarce, they cannibalized their own kind. They were very rarely seen as they dwelt in places that no sane human would ever venture. He closed the book firmly, hiding the illustration away between the thick pages of the book.

Rivulets of water trickled down the rain-splattered windowpane as Hub watched as the city shut down for the night; it was just past closing time, and the bars were extinguishing their signs. The last patrons were making their ways home and finding their ways to bed, turning off their own lights as they went. This time of night was almost like a second sunset in Canal City, as all the lights gradually gave way to darkness. He thought of it as a secret of his; nights like this, when thoughts kept him awake, he would stand in his own darkened window and observe the spectacle as if it was a show that the city put on for him alone.

In the distance, to the south, he looked instinctively for the one light that never went out, but it was gone; the Alpha Sections had destroyed the lighthouse, and it would be a while yet before it was reconstructed to the point of being able to house a new beacon. He sighed as thoughts of Jade erupted stubbornly to the surface of his thoughts. She had seemed well enough today, but he couldn't get the lost look in her eyes from the night before out of his mind. It was torture, to see such anguish and not have there be a damn thing he could do about it.

He threw A Guide to the Subterranean Wonders of Hillys across the room in a fruitless fit of frustration. If there was one thing he hated it was for there to be no clear decisive action for him to take in order to fix something, and Jade was in desperate need of fixing, he could feel it – she had lost her way. She no longer trusted herself. He had seen the way that she limited her contact with the children, as if she was afraid to contaminate them. But what was there for Hub to do? He had only known her a month. The fact that she had rapidly become one of the most rewarding things in his life didn't mean that his presence made any difference in hers. No, Jade would not welcome his interference, and she was not the type that required rescuing. They had saved one another's lives enough times now that it was second nature, but this was one battle in which he could be of no assistance to her. He slugged down his Hyernan Whiskey and was about to attempt sleep when something caught his eye out of his window.

A solitary figure was scuttling down the abandoned street, looking nervously over his shoulder as if expecting to be followed. Hub was almost tempted to go down to make sure the man wasn't being followed, when the furtive figure glanced up and Hub saw his face. It was that rat, Fehn Digler! He wasn't exactly well-respected these days, and as far as Hub was concerned, his ostracization was no better than he deserved. What in Hades was the little weasel doing, running about at this time of night? Reporters could do a lot of damage – and Hub should know.

There was no time to put on his armor, but the black shirt and loose grey pants that he had on were better suited for following someone unnoticed anyways. His feet were bare, but shoes would take too long to put on. _Well, it's not like I can sleep anyways,_ he reasoned as he noiselessly opened the window and crawled out onto the fire escape, descending as swiftly as he could without making noise. For a moment, he thought that it had taken him too long to get to the street, but he caught a flicker of movement as his mark turned a corner three blocks ahead.

He sprinted after Digler, and rounding the corner he nearly gave himself away; the man had stopped under a street light and was checking a map. Quickly flattening himself into the shadows behind a vendor's stand, closed up for the night, Hub held his breath as Digler whirled and looked right where he had just been, pulling something from his coat nervously and holding it in front of him with a shaking hand.

Looking closer, Hub blinked in shock. It was a gun – suddenly the chase became a thing of deadly seriousness. He thought for a second of turning away and returning to bed, but if the bastard was hauling around grossly illegal weapons in the dead of night he was up to no good. Hub wanted to find out what the snake was doing now that the Alphas weren't around to protect their pet propagandist.

_They must have been paying him a pretty penny, too, for him to be able to get his hands on a gun,_ Hub thought, and felt an even greater revulsion towards the man. Guns had been illegal for centuries, and for good reason. Even hardened criminals were loathe to use them, so it was rare to find a blackmarket dealer that would stick their neck out far enough to find one and it cost a shocking amount to obtain one. Hub had known that Digler was a worm, but knowing that he was willing to use a gun reduced his opinion of the man to zero.

Digler scanned the street uneasily, but eventually put the gun away and started walking again. His pace was hurried, and he constantly flung anxious looks over his shoulder, but Hub could tell that the man wasn't accustomed to this sort of thing. No, he was the kind who dealt in other people's sorrows while keeping his well-manicured hands clean of the dirty work.

As his unsuspecting target turned onto a straight, well-lit street, Hub shimmied up a gutter and took to the rooftops. The shingles were slippery from the rain and his bare feet provided little traction,

so he moved with exaggerated caution. There was an alleyway between two buildings and he had to jump the gap, his heart skipping a beat as he leapt.

Digler made his way to a part of the pedestrian district that was very well known to Hub, and an absurd worry found its way into his mind. They were drawing very close to the Akuda Bar. What if Digler had somehow found out their den location? No, he decided resolutely. They had taken every precaution. Outside of the governor, the only people who knew the location of their cell's HQ were himself, Hahn, Jade, Meï, Nino, Peepers and Pey'j. None of them would have let it slip, and the governor had more to lose by them being revealed than she had to gain.

The sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach intensified as Digler checked his map again and walked directly to the Akuda Bar. Hub watched in horror as he rapped twice on the door. The peephole slid open and Digler mumbled something Hub couldn't make out, and the door opened to admit the reporter, banging shut behind him. Hub stood utterly still, anger and fear whirling about in his gut. One of the members of their IRIS cell was involved with that sack of vorax dung somehow. It had to be one of them – not even Mo had the keys to Akuda. As the shock began to recede, he collected his resolve and marched grimly towards the bar. One of his friends was a traitor, and he was going to find out which one it was.


	5. Rescue

I'm back, like a bad penny. This chapter and the following one were very difficult for me to write for some reason, and I almost scrapped the whole project because of a crippling tendency towards perfectionism. However, the fabulous reviews you guys are leaving guilted me into piecing it together and posting it, imperfect as it is. I've got a great section written for a few chapters out, and I really want to get to it. In fact, I have the entire story all mapped out, and I desperately want to get it written.

I will probably not be updating every Monday sharp anymore; however, I don't anticipate any more months-long spells of going incommunicado.

Disclaimer time! I own nothing, Michel Ancel alone is the true god of this storyverse, and I am but a false prophet spinning lies and telling falsehoods.

* * *

**Chapter 5  
Rescue **

As Hub laid his hand on the door to the Akuda bar, a woman's scream tore through the cold night air. It was coming from nearby, and turning his attention towards the sound he could hear the counterpoint of an angry, deeper voice underneath the constant drumming of the rain. He hesitated a moment – it would only take a second to dash into the bar and see who was in there, but if he left, he might never catch them. His hand tightened on the door, just as the scream rang out again more frantically. With a growl of vexation, Hub turned and ran towards the sound.

He rounded the corner to find a young woman cowering on the ground, her head hidden in her hands, reminding him of nothing more than an ostrich with its head in the sand. A young thug was threatening her with a knife, and if the situation had been less potentially lethal, the look of aggravated bewilderment on his shadowed face might have actually been comical. The kid saw him instantly and was out of there faster than a speeding gyrodisk, appearing almost relieved to have an excuse to flee from the melodrama he had incompetently produced. Hub realized that, barefoot and tired, he didn't have a chance of catching the hoodlum and instead focused his attention on the girl.

Kneeling down to her level, he cleared his throat to gently alert her to his presence. She turned her face towards him timidly, and her enormous, frightened brown eyes told of sleepless nights and intense loss. "Miss, are you injured?" he inquired urgently – she was still crying out as if in pain, though he saw no obvious wound. She reacted as if she had been drowning in a storm-tossed sea and he was a lifeline, and practically threw herself into his arms.

"Oh th-thank g-god you showed up," she sobbed, "H-he was going to kill me!" She burst out into uncontrolable, gasping weeping, and Hub awkwardly patted her on the back.

"There, there," he mumbled automatically. Had it been an opportunistic petty criminal, or a more serious lovers' quarrel? "Do you know him? Did you have a fight?"

"N-no," she stammered, "he just c-came up and t-told me to give him money or he'd – he'd – " and she dissolved into tears again and pressed her face into his massive chest. Hub glanced back towards the Akuda Bar in frustration, fighting the urge to roll his eyes. He had never been good at dealing with hysterics even in the best of times, and there was something else he needed to be doing, but he wasn't callous enough to leave the girl here to work herself into a frenzy. She was obviously in need of assistance.

"Come now, miss, let's get you home," he said authoritatively, trying subtly to extract himself from her clutches. "Do you live near here?"

She sniffled and coughed, and managed a watery "No," which was enough to precipitate another round of crying. Hub bit back a groan and urged himself to be patient.

"Are you staying with a friend? At a hostel? Where are you headed?" he pressed on, desperate to get her safely on her way so that he could investigate the bar. Her face crumpled, and he braced himself. With every second that passed, the chance of catching the traitor lessened. In other circumstances he would be less inclined to hurry the poor girl, but at the moment there were other lives at risk too.

"I don't know," she wailed. "I don't have anywhere left to go!" She buried her face again in his shirt, and as he felt the warm wetness of her tears soak through to his skin, he softened a bit. It wasn't her fault that she was mugged at exactly the wrong time, after all. She was clearly – _quite_ clearly – distressed, and he would be complete cad to ignore it.

"Okay, Miss. We'll find you somewhere to spend the night," he assured her, and to his extreme gratitude this seemed to calm her down somewhat. "But first we have to make a quick stop," he stipulated. He _had _to check out the bar, traumatized girl or no. He began walking towards the Akuda bar, and she followed like a lost puppy, clutching his arm tightly. As they reached the bar, he hesitated. She would definitely hamper any attempts he made at stealth, and there was potentially a nervous, gun-wielding scumbag in there. He didn't want to put her in danger, but if he asked her to stay put alone outside, she would probably start bawling again.

"Miss, I need to get something from upstairs here, but the owner is very picky about who he lets run around in his bar after close," he improvised. "I need you to stay in the entryway here, just inside the door. Can you do that?"

She snuffled an affirmation, and he decided that that was the best he could do under the circumstances. Leaving her with an admonishment to stay still and quiet, he made his way noiselessly through the bar, searching warily for any signs of occupants. There was no sign of a soul on the entire first floor, and as he mounted the stairs, he was becoming increasingly uncomfortable. Either the unidentified traitor had taken Digler all the way down into the IRIS den, or they had already left and he had lost the opportunity to discover their identity. Cautiously, he opened the secret passage to the IRIS den, and with mixed relief and aggravation, he found it unoccupied.

Hub closed the passage and sat down on the bed in Room 3 with a noise of disgust. He'd had them right there, in the palm of his hand...and because of the girl downstairs, he might never know who was betraying them and why. _No, it's not fair to blame her,_ he forced himself to think. _It isn't her fault._ But it was extremely difficult not to resent her for the unbelievably bad timing of her cry for help and subsequent neediness.

That thought suddenly reminded him that he had promised to find her a place to spend the night, and he swore under his breath. There was nowhere but his apartment he could take her, and he was not in the mood to be hospitable – a man's home is his castle, and at the moment he didn't feel up to being besieged. Still, she was in need, and it was his duty as a fellow human to help her out. He resigned himself to a night of sleeping on his own couch and headed downstairs to reunite with the terrified girl.

- - -

Jade drummed her fingers and shifted her weight in the driver's seat of the hovercraft, growing impatient. She had been waiting at the spot that she usually met Double H for over ten minutes. They had been planning to attempt to track down at least three of the DomZ monsters today – it was ambitious, but they could do it if they didn't lose any time, which they were currently doing. A frown creased her face; this was the first time she had ever known him to be late. Was it possible that something had gone wrong? Today had already begun badly. She had woken up to the sound of Pey'j coming in just before dawn. He had grumbled something about sleepwalking and refused to elaborate, and she felt that there was something he was keeping from her. With as unreliable and strange as Pey'j had been lately, Jade had come to rely more than she'd realized on Double H's solid and dependable presence. It was not like him at all to be late. 

She knew where his apartment was, though she had not yet been there. As soon as the thought of seeking it out entered her mind, she was drawn to the idea; truthfully, she was more interested to see where her partner lived than she was worried for him, and suddenly her mood shifted from mild annoyance at the lapse in his otherwise exemplary record of timeliness to guilty pleasure in having an excuse to peek in on his personal life. It was strange to know a person so well and yet have such little understanding of their world, and Jade was curious to a fault by nature.

She parked the hovercraft and weaved her way through the early morning crowd of commuters sleepily making their way through the pedestrian district. This was a part of the city that Jade wasn't terribly familiar with, but Double H's directions were good and she found her way to the restored ex-warehouse that his loft was in without any difficulty. The building was open, and she let herself in. His apartment was the very top one, and as she climbed up the spiral staircase, she felt an odd sense of familiarity. At first she couldn't place it, but as she reached the top and looked out a window with a spectacular view, it occured to her: it reminded her of the lighthouse. She smiled to herself at the comparison, and stepped up to knock on his door, hoping that she hadn't passed him on the way.

Double H opened the door almost immediately. He was still disheveled from sleep, his black shirt and loose grey pants crinkled, his dark hair standing on end. He looked distracted and harried, and Jade couldn't help but grin impishly at how unlike her normal perception of him he appeared.

"Late night?" She peeked surreptitiously around his massive frame into his apartment, trying to catch a glimpse of its interior.

Double H ran a hand through his hair and glanced over his shoulder, looking harrassed. "You could say that. Jade, I'm so sorry, I'm running horrifically late..."

"No sweat, partner," she reassured him, beginning to feel a bit guilty at pestering him. She heard muffled movement from inside the apartment, and wondered if he had a pet. Then a second head popped around the doorframe, and she felt something completely unexpected twist inside her. "Oh," she said, her own voice sounding slightly strangled to her ears. "I see." Irrational jealousy welled up in her gut, and she forced it down sternly. Double H was probably her closest friend at the moment, and as unhinged as she was, she didn't feel like sharing, and she hated herself a little bit for being so selfish and possessive.

"Jade, I – "

"Hey, take your time," Jade interrupted, forcing cheer into her voice. "I'll meet you back at the hovercraft when you're ready." She pivoted and took the stairs down two at a time, taking her leave before she said or did something truly stupid. _No ties outside of IRIS, huh?_ She struggled to quell a sudden sense of being betrayed.

She heard footsteps follow her immediately, and feeling resigned, she gathered her breath and turned around. "Double H, don't worry about it, I mean it's not like you – " but it wasn't Double H who had run after her, but the light-haired woman with obnoxiously big brown eyes.

"It's not what it looks like – I mean, that is, nothing happened," the stranger said shyly, and began fidgeting with what Jade at first took for a shapeless dress, but upon closer inspection noticed was actually one of Double H's shirts.

Jade was unable to keep the disbelief from her voice as she replied. "Oh? Nice jumper," she said pointedly, and wondered again where this hostility was coming from.

The woman blushed furiously and turned the full intensity of her gaze on Jade. "No, no...it's not...he saved me," she stammered awkwardly. "And I had nowhere to go. But he was a perfect gentleman, and I'm not trying to steal him!"

At this, Jade laughed. The whole situation was ridiculous. She forced herself to calm down and act rationally. "Hey, relax. Let's start over. I'm Jade, and I'm Double H's _friend_." Stressing the last word, she held out her hand in truce.

- - -

Hub pulled on his clothing as fast as his stupid, fumbling hands would let him, swearing to himself the entire time. Trouble, that's all that woman was, was trouble. This sort of thing was why he couldn't stand damsels in distress – no, give him a girl who could stand up for herself any day. Since the second he'd heard her frantic cries, this woman had done nothing but lay waste to his plans and disorder his life. _To be fair,_ a small but just part of his brain reminded him, _having Jade around hasn't exactly made your life less confusing._

His mind was filled with eyes, big green eyes, open wide and spilling hurt like molten wax from a tipped candle. The memory of the shocked look that had cracked open Jade's face at seeing the other woman – like she'd just been sucker-punched in the gut – propelled him out the door with an urgency he didn't completely understand, and it wasn't until halfway down the twisting staircase that he realized for the second time in eight hours that he had run out of his apartment barefoot.

Hub careened down the stairs, and as he turned the last corner he saw Jade and the girl talking together. He slowed his pace, but his heart continued to pound at an alarming rate. How was it that he could go on covert, death-defying missions into the heart of enemy territory with a calm and reasoned mind, but Jade had managed to turn his life so completely upside-down that he was standing in the lobby of his building, irrationally terrified, in his pajamas and bare feet?

"...more than welcome to stay at the lighthouse," he overheard Jade saying. Hearing him approach, she turned. "Zeri's been filling me in on the details of last night," she explained. "Assuming it's okay with you, we've always got room at the lighthouse for another person." Turning back to the girl (Zeri, apparently–had he really never asked for her name?) she continued: "It's actually kind of perfect. I don't have much time to watch the kids these days, and I worry about them getting into trouble when I'm not there. Double H, we can drop her off on our way out, if you don't mind..." Here Jade stopped, taking in his disheveled appearence and supressing a grin. "...that is, if we're still going?"

"Of course, of course," he babbled, jumping as he realized that he was standing there, mouth agape. "I'll go and get ready. So sorry to keep you waiting, Jade. Miss Zeri."

- - -

"There it is," Jade raised her voice to make herself heard above the hovercraft motor, gesturing to the mound of rubble that used to be her familiar home. "Still sure you want to stay with us? It's not exactly homey at the moment." 

Zeri gazed out at the ruined lighthouse, looking almost as if in a trance. "It feels like so long since I had anywhere to call home," she murmured. "Since the DomZ invaded my neighborhood and stole away my family, there's been nowhere for me to go. I stayed at some of the government shelters, but people kept...disappearing. They brought in the Alpha Sections to protect us, but it only got worse. I wound up feeling safer on the streets. So this...this will suit me just fine."


	6. Surface Tension

Aaaaand, making up for the brevity of the last installment, this chapter is a whopper. Action! Intrigue! Exposition! A brief history of the Universe! Droll Hillyan cussing! Oh yeah, it's got it all.

Sometimes I get frustrated that there are so few fans of BG&E creating or reading fanfiction, but that's the nature of the beast I guess. BG&E is a cult hit, not a mainstream sensation. I could have written some Harry Potter or Buffy fic and been part of those dauntingly enormous communities, but this is the story that drove me to create. But feedback is an incredibly powerful tool, and I just want to take a moment to thank the people who have believed in me enough to keep tabs on this story during my long hiatus. I really appreciate your reviews, and knowing that there are people reading this thing really fuels my motivation to continue. You're all total freakin' rockstars, people. And you have exquisite damn taste for searching out a BG&E story in the first place! Give yourself a giant pat on your infinitely superior back.

Disclaimer of the week: I own nothing, _le sigh. La vie, c'est plein d'injustice_. I know I know, my French, _c'est horrible_. But I figured that as long as I was desecrating Monsieur Ancel's characters, I might as well butcher his native tongue, too.

* * *

**Chapter 6  
Surface Tension**

Jade watched the waves dance past beneath her while the Beluga glided deftly over the surface of the sea, her lips subconsciously pulled into a slight frown. It seemed as if every aspect of her life was somehow tainted; Pey'j's continued lack of communication, Zeri's sad story, and Jade's own doubts as to whether she should let herself be around the children much at all–so many things were eating away at her. Zeri's arrival, however unsettling, was a bit of a blessing. Ever since Jade had begun to have those awful visions, she'd been doubting herself more and more. Was it possible for her to infect the children somehow? Was it her presence on Hillys that had drawn the DomZ here? If so, how many people had died because of her? And after this morning, there was a new question: when–and why–had she become so possessive of her partner?

Jade stole a surreptitious glance at Double H. He was surveying the seascape as they went, appearing to be surprisingly relaxed. His armor shimmered in the midday sun, and Jade spared a thought to how hot it must be, but he showed no signs of being uncomfortable. She had come to enjoy the time they spent together, gliding across the vast Hillyan ocean. It had been the most peaceful part of her life for the past few weeks. She let herself slip into the rhythm of the hovercraft's bouncing stride across the waves, and her worry and self-doubt began to evaporate under the benign caress of the sun. After several minutes, a beeping from the control panel stirred her from her reverie.

"Well, here we are," Jade announced dubiously, easing off of the throttle and surveying their surroundings with a mix of wonder and wariness. "Are you _sure _this is the right place? It looks so...undisturbed."

Following the governor's next lead, they had come to this place to hunt down the second reported DomZ monster. But the location was anything but ominous. The depressing weather of the previous day had moved on, and the sun shone graciously down on the lush island before them. Its north end tapered down gradually to the sea, but the south end terminated in dramatic cliffs that formed a C, creating a sheltered lagoon into which a stunning waterfall emptied. The water in the bay was breathtakingly clear, its ripples catching and throwing the sunlight into mesmerizing, graceful patterns against the cliff face. Around the base of the falls, a mist hovered, putting the final touch on the fantastic feel of the setting.

"I'm postitive, Miss Jade," Double H replied, dutifully double-checking the Beluga's navigation system. "The map is quite precise." He glanced around, taking in the beauty of the place with due admiration while scanning for any abnormalities. "Five separate freight boats have been reported missing somewhere in this approximate area over the past two weeks; another two have been attacked nearby but managed to escape. This island is the geographical average of the strikes."

Jade took in the isle's luxuriant vegetation and peaceful atmosphere, trying to single out what it was about their gorgeous surroundings that seemed odd to her. "It does seem an unlikely place for an ambush, though. It's so still..." She trailed off, and began examining the area with renewed scrutiny. "That's it, Double H – can you feel it? There's no life here! No birds, no fish...no animals at all!"

Double H looked around, surprised. "Quite right, Miss Jade. I would not have – aha! Look over there, in the fog." He gestured just to the left of the waterfall, directing her gaze to the tell-tale signs of a sunken cargo ship. "Crates – we must be on the right track!"

"Yes, I see them," Jade affirmed, sadness showing around her mouth at the thought of the deaths the impersonal crates represented. She thought also of the kids back at the lighthouse – most of them needed new clothing, and there would be school supplies to buy soon. She glanced around, as if checking for survivors who might still stake a claim. "I suppose it won't hurt anyone at this point, if we see what's inside," Jade reasoned, feeling uncomfortably like a grave-robber. Deploying the hovercraft from the Beluga, she steered in towards the wreckage, feeling a growing nervousness. "Double H, does it feel as if we're being...watched?" she murmured, instinctually lowering her voice.

"I couldn't say, Miss Jade. There is a definite – _what the...?!_" He jerked back in his seat involuntarily; Jade glanced in the direction of his gaze and did the same. From the dense mist around the base of the waterfall, their quarry was skittering across the surface of the water straight towards them, its fearsome maw gaping open. Her reflexes mercifully swifter than rational thought, Jade swerved aside at the last moment, barely avoiding collision with the creature.

They had found the DomZ monster – or rather, it had found them. It had been lurking in the heavy mist near the waterfall, watching their every move and waiting for them to draw near enough for an ambush. It was built very much like an impossibly enormous insect. It had eight long, thin, articulated legs, six of which moved with blinding speed, carrying it directly across the surface of the sea; its front two legs were not running, but groping sickeningly towards them. Its head sported two compound eyes and a set of fearsome pincers, which were clacking as if in anticipation of its next meal. Imbedded in the center of its oblong thorax was the telltale green orb of a DomZ-infected giant pearl.

"Out to sea, Miss Jade! We need room to manoeuver!" Double H urgently advised. Immediately seeing the wisdom of his plan, she brought the hovercraft about and sped to the open water, leading the nimble DomZ monster out onto a more favorable battlefield.

"Take control of the guns!" Jade barked, focused intently on their prey. It was taking every bit of her skill and focus to keep up with the monster's agile movements, and she was barely managing to avoid its insanely quick zig-zagging rushes. It was impossibly swift for its size and its ability to somehow dart across the water as if it was solid ground gave it a distinct edge, able to change directions instantly while the hovercraft lagged behind, drifting through each turn.

Neither was it an easy target to hit; Double H struggled to get the thing in his sights, and it was simply moving too fast for the cannon to get a lock. Its limbs and body were so slender that it was almost impossible to strike, and neither Jade's wild maneuvering nor the constant pitching of the sea made his job any easier.

"Can't we reattach to the Beluga?!" Hub shouted as the monster barely missed them.

"I'm trying!" Jade yelled back in frustration. "I can't afford to hold still long enough for it to lock onto us! This dang thing is too vorax-flogging fast!"

As if to prove her point, on its next weaving assault the monstrous thing anticipated Jade's evasive action and with deadly accuracy leapt directly onto the hovercraft, dragging itself onto the roof. Its weight pushed the craft down into the water, and Jade cried out as she briefly lost control. She yanked the lever that adjusted hover power to its maximum weight setting, and breathed a short-lived sigh of relief as they bobbed back up to skim the surface. She then noticed that Double H, unable to target the top of the hovercraft with the guns, was looking grim as well.

The roof creaked ominously, and Jade yelped as the monster jabbed one of its chitinous claws brutally through the thin metal of the ceiling, mere inches from Double H's head. She met his eyes in a mutual look of horror as they realized that from its current position, it could either stab them to death or tear the hovercraft to shreds within minutes with utter impugnity. A look of grim resolve settled on Double H's face and he reached for his T-hammer.

"Open the hatch!" he cried, moving to the rear of the hovercraft.

"Are you insane?!" Jade yelled. "It'll tear you to pieces!"

The monster punched another hole through the roof, narrowly missing Jade's left shoulder. "Jade, hurry! It's going to sink us!" he demanded insistently. Worry in her eyes, she complied, and he darted out the hatch swinging his hammer awkwardly with one hand while clinging to the hovercraft for dear life with the other. He struck out at one of the monster's limbs with all the force he could muster and through the sheer factor of surprise his blow struck home, denting the roof slightly in the process.

Hurt, the monster keened terribly and released the little craft. The sudden absence of its weight sent them flying up several feet, and Jade watched helplessly as the abrupt motion jolted Double H loose. She tried to catch a hold of him as he began to fall away, but her hands slid uselessly against his smooth armor, unable to find a positive hold. He cried out in surprise as he tumbled into the sea where he struggled vainly against gravity's irresistable pull on his massive armor and hammer.

His head sank below the surface, and no amount of thrashing slowed his inexorable descent. Bubbles of air desperately wrenched from his lungs bobbled to the surface. Jade watched in utter horror as he sank out of sight.

With a sudden stroke of inspiration, Jade released all of the PODs at once in retrieval mode, targeting Double H rather than a pearl. They dove into the water and she held her breath as they disappeared. Time slowed intolerably as she waited for them to reappear – was he too heavy for them? Had he sunk too far?

Mere seconds later, though it felt like a lifetime, Double H burst out of the water as the PODs crammed him unceremoniously into the hovercraft. He coughed and sputtered, disoriented by his sudden and graceless ascent. Relief flooding into her, Jade helped him to sit up. Catching his breath, he looked up with gratitude in his eyes.

"Jade, thank you," he expressed his gratitude fervently. "I thought I was headed on a one-way scenic trip to the ocean floor for a second there," he admitted ruefully.

"You know, you might want to have a little talk with your travel agent about that," Jade wisecracked. "They should have warned you about the ride's baggage weight limit. I mean, come on – you couldn't have let go of your stupid hammer to _save your own life?!_"

Double H looked sheepishly at his T-hammer. "_Never Drop Your Weapon,_ Carlson and..." seeing her murderous glare, he tapered off. "Er..."

An electronic voice cut in, emanating from the hovercraft's control panel: "Is very touching reunion, but we are about to be having company," Secundo interrupted urgently, saving Double H from Jade's rebuke. Jade dashed to the controls, and once again she managed to dodge the surprise attack just in the nick of time. She struggled to focus herself on the task at hand; the chase was on again.

"It won't stop wiggling around!" she shouted in frustration as she activated a boost capsule to narrowly avoid its onslaught. "Can't you just shoot the drazgatted thing?"

"I'm trying," he grunted as he released a cannon shot. It missed by a meter, sending up a plume of water. Jade stared at it, the gears turning in her head.

"Double H, that's it! It's relying on surface tension to stay on the water – if you can't hit it directly, try aiming _beneath _it!" He furrowed his brow in concentration and complied, leading the target and aiming low. He let the shot go, and the monster floundered for a moment, struggling for a positive foothold as the water beneath it erupted in spray. That instant was all that Hub needed – he sent another volley home, hitting center mass.

The monster squealed and clumsily turned, fleeing back towards the lagoon. They followed a breath behind it, but even wounded it soon pulled ahead. As they entered the lagoon the monster made a beeline for the waterfall.

"The blasted thing is going to hide again," Double H burst out in vexation. "It's going straight for the mist!"

Jade narrowed her eyes. "No," she said slowly. "It's going straight _through_ the mist." And without hesitation, she took the hovercraft directly into the falls.

- - -

Pey'j sat down across the table from Meï, and peered intently at her over the mound of books. Engrossed in the arcane text before her, she was oblivious to his scrutiny. Losing patience, he cleared his throat loudly, and then choked on a laugh as she jumped in surprise. 

"Smooth yer tail, little lady. I'm just here to see what you've dug up so far. Anything in there about Shauni?"

Giving Pey'j her very best I-knew-you-were-there-the-whole-time look, Meï removed her glasses and set the book down ceremoniously. "Well, that's actually a bit strange. The word _shauni _is really – "

Pey'j made a startled noise, and leaned forwards. "Word? It's not a name?"

Meï shook her head slowly, tapping her notes with her stylus. "No, of that part I'm quite sure. It's from the language of the old ones. It's made up of two parts: _sha'u_, depending on the context, means either heart, womb, or a source of energy and life; _ni_ is simply a suffix to designate the first person singular possessive."

Pey'j's eyes glossed over before she'd even gotten halfway through. "And in real words, that means...what?"

"Ah...crudely put, _shauni_ means 'my source' or 'the origin of my life force,' I suppose. Roughly."

Pey'j sat back in his chair, crossing his arms and squinting, as if to focus better on the concept. "All right. So how'd a word from these 'old ones' wind up comin' out of a DomZ?"

"Well, that's the strange part! The earliest records of its occurrence among the DomZ aren't until _after _its language of origin had already become defunct."

"Meï, if you don't pick smaller words to throw at me, I'm going to throw something big at you," Pey'j threatened. "We ain't all scholars. Now start from the top – who in tarnation are these old ones you're prattlin' about?"

The cat-woman heaved a deep sigh, and settled into her chair. "Well, they were the dominant race of the universe, five thousand years ago or so. They were the first race known to have discovered interstellar travel. In fact, according to legend, they discovered some way to eliminate illness and even managed to reverse the effects of aging. Effectively, they would have been immortal."

"Okay," said Pey'j slowly. "So why aren't they runnin' about now, bossin' the rest of us all around?"

"See, that's where things get odd. Something happened, and their discoveries stopped working. Perhaps the species mutated somehow, perhaps something in their environment changed...one way or another, it all fell apart. Because they had planned on living forever, very few written records had been made, so when they started dying they lost their collective knowledge with a terrible swiftness. That's also why we know so little of them, by the way. Then, to compound their dilemma, a terrible plague swept through their people, decimating their population brutally. Within the span of a hundred years, they had gone from the top of the heap to virtually extinct."

"Virtually?" Pey'j leaned in, suddenly attentive. "How many are left?"

Meï shrugged. "No one knows. There may be a whole planet of them, somewhere, if they've kept to themselves. They may be gone entirely. There's absolutely no way to know. But the point is, for all purposes they died out – and with them, the language died too. And that's why it's so odd that three thousand or so years later, that word would start popping up again in an entirely different species, whose primary source of communication isn't even verbal."

"Okay, right. That brings us back to the DomZ." Pey'j rubbed his temples roughly, trying to absorb all the information. "So what is _shauni_ to them – you said it means 'my' somethin'-or-other. But I thought they had one of them group consciousness things."

Meï pursed her lips and tilted her head back. "Sort of. That is – they do. Their minds are somehow linked through the queen, and many scholars theorize that hers is the only mind capable of independant thought. But there has been some evidence to justify a – "

Pey'j held up his hand. "Whoa, there, with your theories and justifications. Just the basics, Meï."

She looked pained, but continued: "So this word from an ancient, defunct tongue pops up in the DomZ, and it just happens to be around the same time that they started to really get aggressive in their expansion. They weren't always so active in invading other planets," she admitted begrudgingly. "They used to keep mostly to themselves. They used to only speak their own language. And those two anomalies somehow seem to coincide."

"How?" Pey'j demanded succinctly.

"I have no idea," Meï admitted ruefully, staring at the pile of books before her. "So little is known of the DomZ before they started showing up at everybody's doorstop with some friendly neighborhood genocide."

"Well," Pey'j grunted, extracting himself from the chair. "I guess I'd better let you get back to puzzlin' it out, then. All them big words have conjured up a mighty thirst in me." He clapped her on the back and headed upstairs to the bar, as if to prove his point.

- - -

Double H barely had time to understand Jade's intent before they were underneath the waterfall, bombarded by tons of water per second. The deluge tossed the hovercraft around like a toy, and he wondered frantically if it could sustain the battering. Just as he was preparing to accept his untimely demise for a second time that day, they broke through the chaos of the waterfall itself into the cavern concealed behind the watery curtain. 

The chamber was infused with blue light, its only source of illumination the sunlight that filtered through the waterfall. The water in the grotto was like a living thing, the crests and troughs of its waves each like the inhale and exhale of a breath. The light was reflected back up through the liquid, giving the water a dazzling and otherworldly azure glow as if it was lit from within. The rock walls of the cavern near the entrance were thrown into sharp relief by the single source of light, but further from the entrance, deep shadows obscured the detail of the cavern's shape. Jade and Double H looked around in mute reverence. This place was positively unreal.

"My respects, Miss Jade," Double H said in quiet awe, "that was nicely done – although I did think that we were goners for a second there."

"Now where did it go?" Jade puzzled. She began shining the hovercraft's headlights into every nook of the cavern, searching for the elusive beast. In the farthest wall from the entrance, the cave wall sloped gently up and away from the water and a tiny tunnel was revealed just above the waterline. "There's no way it could have fit in there," she pondered out loud. "That tunnel couldn't possibly be big enough!"

"Never say never, Miss Jade. We must investigate it," Double H insisted, and she steered the hovercraft onto the small section of dry rock.

Outside of the hovercraft, the brilliantly glowing blue grotto was even more surreal. The sound of the waves lapping at the walls of the cavern echoed endlessly, but the noise of the waterfall seemed distant and unimportant. The place had an eerie peacefulness to it, and a sense of timelessness. It felt almost as if it existed separate from the rest of the world, as if when they left they might find that a hundred years had passed in the outside world, or mere seconds. But somewhere, lurking in this still place, was a monster that could ensure that they would never leave this place alive, and at the moment they had no idea where it was.

The tunnel was as small as it had looked from the hovercraft, and Jade could not believe that the monster would have been able to squeeze through. "I could crawl through there fairly easily," she pondered, "but could you? If _you _can't, there's no way that thing would have fit."

Double H inspected the mouth of the tunnel thoroughly, shining a lantern in to see how deep it went. "It widens out after about two meters," he said cautiously, "and I think I could just barely fit through the opening here. But I would have to take off my armor to do so," he admitted uneasily. "I think you're right, Miss Jade; there must be another exit somewhere that we missed."

Jade scanned the waterline of the cave carefully. "I don't see anywhere else that we could land the hovercraft," she thought out loud. "But it's in here somewhere, I know. I can feel it..." she hugged her arms around her chest, goosebumps running up and down her back. "It's that feeling again, like we're being watched." Glancing around again and still finding nothing, frustration began to show in her face. "Where _is _it?"

A drop of liquid hit her forehead. She looked up, and scarcely had time to open her mouth to cry out before the thing dropped onto her from the shadowed roof of the cavern, from which it had been stalking them since they entered through the waterfall. It clutched her tightly with its long and spindly but deceptively powerful legs, and the green orb in its belly filled her vision. She felt a powerful draw, and the world outside of the sphere fell away into darkness.

_Shauni, bëthųůn shųůdra, _the strange but familiar voice filled her head. _We are one, shauni. Leave this body. Forget this pathetic human existence. Return to me!_

"I know you..." she whispered, drawn in inexplicably by the alien voice. "Who are you?" she queried dreamily.

_I am that which you feed with every breath. You are my source, the origin of my power. I am that which you are destined to be. I am the completion of your essence. You are my beginning, and I am your end. Together we will be eternal again. I was riven in two, and those that stripped you from me hid you away, but I have sought you out._

The voice was pervasive, and Jade felt herself gravitating towards it as if caught in its orbit. Even as she sensed a part of herself yearning towards the presence, another voice called her back in the direction from which she had started. "_JADE!_" it bellowed, and an inhuman screech jerked her fully out of the trance.

Wrenched suddenly back into awareness of the world around her, she found that the awful piercing cry was coming from the DomZ monster. In obvious agony, it dropped her and focused its full attention on its attacker. Two of its back legs completely broken off, it no longer had the unsettling darting speed it had before, but it was still terrifyingly powerful, and Double H was struggling to fend off its percussive attacks with his energy shield.

"Jade!" he yelled, his voice full of concern. "Are you with me? Are you hurt?" She shook her head to clear it, and forced herself into action.

"I'm fine," she shouted back, resolutely releasing her Daï-jo and preparing to throw herself into the fight. She sized up the situation, and held herself back. Its concentration was utterly riveted on Double-H, and she took advantage of its lack of interest in her to get several shots at the green protrusion on its thorax with her gyrodisc launcher. Reacting to the new threat, it turned its abdomen to her and released a stream of noxious, acidic bile that she narrowly dodged. Noticing that the monster had to unbalance itself slightly to aim its rear to fire, an idea hatched in her head.

Jade fell back, waiting for another opportunity. "Double H, get ready to hit that thing hard, on my mark!" she advised, and took his grunt for an agreement. The monster reared back to strike at him again, and she launched a volley of discs into its belly. Once again, it turned itself and pivoted its abdomen awkwardly towards her. She screamed "NOW!" as she dived over the deadly stream of acid, and Double H struck home with a brutal strike, which unbalanced it yet further. Her dive had brought her directly into position as planned, and she struck out with all the force she could muster, toppling the behemoth onto its back. It thrashed its legs in violently in desperation, but it was helpless in this position, and Double H triumphantly landed the killing blow to its belly.

They watched in relief as the sphere fell from its twisted black casing, bounced off of the monster's chitinous belly, and came to a rest on the rock. It gradually faded from bilious green to a pale, clear blue, and Jade retrieved it.

Holding it up and staring into its core, she found it difficult to believe that it was physically the same now as it had been mere moments prior as it had sucked her consciousness away from her. What were these things, to the DomZ? And why did they seem to have such power over her?

"It's because I'm one of them, isn't it," she murmured tonelessly, scanning the pearl automatically into her SAC. "It's because I'm one of them that their power affects me more than others."

"That's a load of hogwash," Double H snapped with uncharacteristic vehemence, which startled Jade into meeting his eyes. "It's utter rubbish, Jade. Look at yourself," he went on, grasping her hands and holding them before her face. "Do you see any green balls growing out of your skin? Any dark, twisting growths? What about disfiguring tissue, any of that? No," he answered for her, his voice softening. "No, Jade. Remember the Alpha Section guards? That's what it looks like, when a human is possessed by the DomZ. If you were no longer human, you would know." He squeezed her hands once, and let them drop. Without his touch she felt oddly bereft, and she clutched her elbows tightly as if to make up for the lost contact.

"I guess," she conceded, but her voice lacked conviction. Hub watched her with worry in his eyes and a feeling of helplessness in his heart. How could anyone so undoubtedly good question her own nature?

- - -

Alone at a corner table in the Akuda Bar, Pey'j stared into the potent amber liquid in his glass, swirling it idly as he lost himself in thought. The more that he learned, the less he liked the whole situation. He almost wanted to march back down into the IRIS den and tell Meï to stop digging up the past and find a new hobby, but that was a bloody stupid impulse. Jade was in danger, and to pretend otherwise would only put her at more risk. But no, that wasn't entirely right – it wasn't just that Jade was _in_ trouble, she _was_ trouble. 

He slammed his glass down in a sudden rush of anger and resentment. _Damn it to Hades,_ he thought angrily. After twenty years one would think he would be accustomed to the notion that Jade was a liability, not a loved one, but he hadn't been able to think that way since the first time she'd ever smiled at him. _It's just not right, what we did to her,_ he thought for the millionth time. She'd been an innocent child – a mere infant – and they had taken her and thrown her right into the heart of this ancient conflict. How many had come before, he wondered, and how had they dealt with their lot in life? Was there any way to give her back a normal life?

He staggered to the door of the bar. Mo called out after him with concern clear in his bovine voice, but Pey'j ignored his friend. He just wanted to go home and find a way to forget about everything Meï had told him.

- - -

The lights of Canal City rose from the horizon to greet Jade and Hub as they drew nearer to home. The evening wasn't that chilly, but Jade was shivering nonetheless. Recognizing the symptoms of shock, Double H had made her wrap the ship's emergency blanket around her shoulders, but her vacant look was more difficult to remedy. 

"So what do you make of your new recruit?" he asked abrutly, feeling a sudden need to fill the silence between them. Jade looked over at him, startled out of her reverie.

"Recruit? I–oh, you mean Zeri?" She turned her gaze back out to the rapidly approaching skyline, and the empty spot where the lighthouse's beacon should be. "She's had a hard time of it. She lost her baby to the DomZ, you know–she told me while you were playing with Fehn. I can see the pain in her eyes when she looks at the kids."

"I can see it too, Jade," he said softly, but it wasn't the pain in Zeri's eyes that he was thinking about. Ever since their final encounter with the DomZ high priest, Jade had been withdrawn from the children. She used to be so free with them, and now she acted as if her presence would taint them. Hub turned his gaze to the lighthouse shelter. New scaffolding had gone up since they had left that morning, and even as they watched, the temporary makeshift beacon flickered on as dusk drifted lazily into night. He cleared his throat. "You know what else I see in her?" he asked, and without waiting for an answer continued: "Joy. The children give her joy. She may have lost her own child, but there are beautiful, clever kids there that survived. They're our future, and I think she's glad to see it."

As they detached from the Beluga and pulled into the hangar, a familiar porcine form began to lift his hand in welcome. They docked, and as the battle-damaged hovercraft came into full view, his piggy hand suddenly stopped mid-wave. His face fell into an agonized mask of shock, and he dropped his half-empty bottle of Gaznian firewater to clutch his heart as his balance wavered. His drawling voice rose in a wail of horror:

"What in tarnation, damnation, and the deepest pile of crochax dung in Hades have you done to my beautiful hovercraft?!"


	7. Trust

A few states over and a melted hard drive later, here is Chapter 6! I should say, here is Chapter 6.2.0, because the whole bloody thing was set to be posted when my laptop imploded. Argh.

Special thanks to Alexa-B, who drew a beautiful piece of fan art for a scene from Chapter 1. If you like it, please let her know - it's called "Personal Paramedic" and can be seen in her deviantart gallery at alexa-b dot deviantart dot com.

Of course: the story may be mine, yet it is but an act of supplication to Michel Ancel's beautiful characters and world. I can only strive to do them justice with my words.

* * *

**Chapter 7  
Trust**

From a distance, the meteorites looked like mere bits of stellar flotsam as they entered the hiveworld's atmosphere. But as they grew closer, they revealed themselves to be products of intelligent design. The hive queen watched through compound eyes glittering with greedy anticipation as the DomZ armada began to gather.

It had been waiting for so long. For thousands of years It had lived half a life, a shadow of an existence, ever since the Old Ones had stripped It of Its power. But It had felt Her consciousness, yesterday. She had felt the draw to return, to make them both whole. It would seek Her out, and demand what was Its to claim. Oh yes, together they would claw their way out of the shadows and make the light tremble to shine upon them. Soon, the universe would bow down before their combined power once again.

- - -

Hub laid in bed, awake but not yet resigned to face the world for the day. The freshly-risen sunlight danced playfully through his curtains. The city outside was not yet quite awake, and the silence of the dawn filled the air with an almost tangible quality. The radio alarm, going off at its pre-set time, broke the fragile illusion of peacefulness abruptly. Reluctant to stand and face the day, Hub let the stream of news wash over him in an ablution of procrastination. 

"–nd from the southeast. Some fog possible in the evening, and heavy fog likely tonight. And now for today's top story: the Canal City University Research Center released a study yesterday showing that population density continues to grow unchecked throughout Hillys. Population forecasts for the next decade imply a need to begin importing food on a much greater scale, and the mayor of Canal City has recently addressed the issue in a statement that more areas will be set aside for high-density residential zoning. Even with these and other measures, social scientists are concerned with the impact a dramatically increased population density will have on the quality of life for all Hillyans, and on the environment. The rise in population seems to be caused by a combination of factors, including extended life expectancy across all demographics and a significantly rising birthrate over the past decade and a half. In other news, Governor Eve Arroya reported that another rogue DomZ creature was safely eradicated yesterday afternoon. The monster had been responsible for the destruction of six cargo ships in the East Moon Island area, leaving over 30 dead and wou– "

Hub stirred himself enough to flick his rough and callused hand over the control pad to mute the radio. Hearing of the one DomZ creature he and Jade had killed yesterday gave him no pleasure, knowing that there were still more remaining and that more lives would be lost before he and Jade could vanquish them all. His heart sank yet further to think that the lingering DomZ creatures weren't his most pressing concern. He had a traitor to catch, and no idea where to begin or who to suspect.

With a heavy sigh, Hub swung his muscular legs out of bed and stood to face the day ahead. Depressed or not, he had to meet Nino in time to catch a ride to the lighthouse.

- - -

A few klicks away at the lighthouse, the prevailing mood was polarly opposite. Oumi's parents had made contact with the lighthouse and would soon be by to reunite with their daughter. Pablo's father had simply shown up on their doorstep, tears of joy in his eyes to find his son alive and whole. Pablo's glee had been infectious, and Oumi was so full of eager anticipation that she could barely sit still for more than a breath. She was constantly bouncing up to peer out the window, waiting for the first sign of her parents' arrival. 

Reconstruction of the lighthouse was going swiftly and smoothly, and the new IRIS transmitter quietly grew closer and closer to completion, hidden in plain sight. Last night Nino had shown Jade where one could see bits of the transmitter, and if she looked carefully she could just barely distinguish them. When the lighthouse was finished it would appear completely innocuous, but its façade of normalcy would conceal a secret presence. _Just like me, _Jade thought ruefully, but quickly shoved the thought aside. This was the day that she had been working towards for the past few years, and she wasn't going to let anything ruin it. She had been watching over these children in the desperate hope that their parents would come back to them one day, and for Oumi and Pablo that day had just come.

In the den, Zeri was taking a part in one of Vehn's elaborate fantasies. She was fantastic with the children. There was still a horrible sadness about her, but when she interacted with the kids, it faded a bit. Watching her come back to life, bit by bit, Jade realized just how little she had actually lost in the war herself. Pey'j was the only family she had ever known–at least, he was the only family she could remember. And distant though he had been of late, he was still here. None of the children had died. Woof hadn't even been taken in the first place. In fact, she had actually come out of the war with more friends than she had gone into it with: Double H, Meï, Hahn, Nino, Peepers...she felt connected to them in a way that only life-threatening intrigue could bring people together.

Oumi jumped up in excitement as a hovercraft drew near. She ran to the window and peered out, full of hope. As the 'craft came close enough to identify, her face fell in disappointment. "Oh, it's just Nino's guys," she sighed, and resumed her watch.

"Is Uncle H with them?" Fehn asked eagerly, jumping up from the floor. "He said he'd come with them today!"

"Yeah, he's there," Oumi answered, and Fehn ran out to greet his friend. He and Double H had formed a real bond. Fehn loved to hear his stories, and Double H was always more than happy to play along with the young goat's imaginary adventures. Grinning ear to ear, Double H swung Fehn up onto his broad shoulders and jogged to the lighthouse.

"Good morning, Miss Jade!" he greeted her. "They're singing our praises on Hillyan Public Radio this morning."

"Really?" She was surprised–the governor had been abundantly and apologetically clear that she couldn't thank them publicly.

"Well, not exactly. But they did mention the DomZ creature we took out."

"You guys killed a DomZ monster?" Fehn yelled eagerly. "Jade, you didn't tell us! Uncle H, you gotta tell us how it went!"

Double H glanced at her for permission, and, grinning, she nodded her assent. As the kids settled around "Uncle" H with rapt attention inscribed in every line of their faces–even Oumi had abandoned her post at the window to hear the tale of their thrilling heroics–Jade slipped away to check up on her own "Uncle."

After a brief search, a broken stream of colorful curses led Jade into the hangar, where Pey'j appeared to be surveying the damage on the hovercraft with a very grumpy face. "Now, I ain't sure what they've done to my poor darlin'," he growled, "but I kin assure ya, I am gonna find a way to set it right."

Jade paused for a moment, grinning. "You're getting sentimental in your old age, lard-butt," she teased as she approached. "A person might think you were talkin' about your first born child, not a machine!" Caught off guard, Pey'j spun around with a tight grip on his wrench.

"Aw, Jade!" he stammered, putting a porky hand to his chest. "Ya shouldn't be startlin' an old pig like me, flagnabbit. My heart ain't as spry as it used to be, li'l miss!" Concern flickered across Jade's face. She'd been teasing Pey'j about his age for a while now, ever since he turned fifty, but she'd never seen him acting old until after his ordeal on Selene.

"Pey'j, have you seen Doc Cauble recently?" she asked him pointedly. "You told me you'd go in for a checkup after we got settled back in."

Pey'j snorted and turned back to the hovercraft. "Doc, schlock," he grumbled. "Darn quacks can't tell me nuthin' 'cept what I already know, an' that's that I ain't gettin' any younger. There's plenty better ways I outta be spendin' my time, like fixin' this here hovercraft you'n your tin-can sidekick are hell-bent on rippin' to bits!"

Jade shuffled her foot on the ground, honestly sorry that she'd allowed one of his precious pet projects to get damaged on her watch, but keenly aware that she still needed it to finish the governor's mission. "About that...well..."

Pey'j turned to give her a good glare. "Cat got yer tongue, li'l lady? What is it?"

"Well, ah...I was wondering how soon we can take her back out," Jade said sheepishly. "Double H is already here, and we've got a couple more DomZ monsters to track down today--"

"Ha!" Pey'j interrupted her. "You ain't touchin' this baby 'til I got her all fixed up. She's mussed up so bad I kin barely b'lieve you got her to dock with the Beluga, and I kin darn sure tell you that the poor girl can't break atmosphere 'til I get her patched up. No, you two hooligans'll jest hafta find another hovercraft to trash 'til I get this one all fixed up."

"But Uncle P'e–"

"End of discussion!" he cut her off gruffly, and returned to tenderly ministering to his battle-damaged 'craft. Jade, full of stunned indignance, forced herself to count to ten. It hadn't been her fault – or Double H's – that the hovercraft had been damaged. In fact, it was mere dumb luck that it hadn't succumbed to the inevitable before this. She had no idea why Pey'j was blowing this out of proportion, but she knew that in this mood he would be utterly intractable. She and Double H were land-bound until he deemed the hovercraft seaworthy again. Her high spirits shattered, she stomped out of the hangar.

- - -

Peeking around the aft bumper of the hovercraft, Pey'j subconsciously held his breath as he watched her go. As she left his sight, he let his hammer-wrench drop with a deep sigh. 

"That was a close call, Peyajik," a deep, velvety voice rumbled from a makeshift stellar communicator sitting on the hood of the hovercraft. "Do you think she realized that you were communicating off-world?"

Pey'j shook his head slowly, absent-mindedly rubbing a new callus in the middle of his hoofed hand. "Naw, she thought I was talkin' to myself. She thinks I was talkin' about the draz-gatted hovercraft, too!" He glanced over the fully-operational hovercraft, regretting the necessary misdirection. "I really cain't be lettin' her take it out, though. I'm usin' its battery to power this ramshackle thing. I still cain't believe this hunk o' junk is reachin' you, but I'm sure glad it works."

"I'm also glad, Peyajik. I was...worried when our communication ceased so suddenly, and then when the transmitter on Selene went down, I feared for the worst." The voice paused, and softened as it continued: "I do see what you mean about your relationship with the girl having suffered. While in the past I have often voiced my concern about how close a bond you had cultivated with the girl, from your report it does seem to have increased her resistance to DomZ control far beyond that of the previous vessels. Now that I see your connection with her faltering, I find myself troubled anew."

Pey'j leaned against the hovercraft, shaking his head sadly. "You see how it is? I cain't but talk to her without I wind up yellin' at her. I feel like if we were ta sit down and talk actual-like, she'd start right in askin' all the wrong questions, and I ain't got nuthin' but the wrong answers. You gotta help me, Malek. I cain't go on yellin' at my little girl like this all the damn time. I-"

Pey'j's thought was cut off by a puff of blue smoke. With a strangled curse, he jumped forwards, only to see one of the elements of the communicator go up in white flame. Throwing an arm in front of his face to protect his eyes from the white-hot sparks, he backed away from the explosion. Blinded by the light of the flash, he groped helplessly for the extinguisher grenade he kept on his belt, but by the time he had found it and tossed it into the smoldering machinery, half of the communicator had been reduced to a charred and melted mess. Beyond anger but not yet ready to despair, the battle-hardened pig took a deep breath and ruefully began to sift through the wreckage for reusable parts.

- - -

Jade was fuming. Why was her uncle being so cruel to her? What was he keeping from her? She knew that he wasn't being fully honest. Every time they spoke he obfuscated, became combative, or told her lies of omission. And this wasn't just some routine youth-to-adulthood identity crisis on her part; the secrets in her past were actively putting others in danger. Whatever her connection was with the DomZ, it had almost cost her and Double H their lives yesterday when she had gone into a trance during their battle with the sea-walker. She needed to be in control of herself. The war wasn't over – she could sense that much blindfolded in a cave. The entire world felt energetically charged and unstable, the way air does before a violent storm, and living on an exposed island had taught her not to ignore such instinctual warnings. But how was she to prepare for the trials to come if her own uncle – her only family – was withholding information from her? 

Her feet led her automatically to the bilaoberry tree, her favorite spot on the island. Fighting back the red streaks of anger obscuring her vision, she kicked a rock to vent her frustration. It sailed through the air with respectable velocity, only to hit the shiny, polished surface of Double H's chest plate with a dull _thunk_. Startled out of her rage and into shame, Jade let out a yelp and clapped her hand over her mouth, eyes wide with chagrin.

"Never fear, Miss Jade, such projectiles are worthless against my armor!" Double H joked clumsily and cracked a self-conscious grin. Embarrassed but relieved by his reaction, Jade blushed and let out a strangled laugh.

"This used to be the place I came to relax. Now it looks like it's become the place I come to throw tantrums," she said ruefully. She folded her legs beneath her, and gestured to an adjacent rock. "Care to join me? We have all day."

With a creak of his armor, Double H accepted the invitation and reclined beside Jade. "All day?" he repeated quizzically.

Jade shook her head in frustration, and fought to keep the vitriol out of her tone. "Pey'j won't let us take the Beluga until he gets the hovercraft all fixed up, and I get the feeling he'd rather not see either of us driving her again...ever. He's blaming us for her damage." She turned to meet his gaze, brushing her jet black hair out of her brilliantly emerald eyes with an unconscious flick of her fingers. "I'm sorry for wasting your time," she apologized, her brow wrinkled with concern. "I can't even offer you a ride home!" she ejaculated, her voice rife with vexation.

Double H's face softened, and he reached a finger out to rest lightly on the worry-crease in her forehead. "It's quite all right, Jade – my time here is _never_ wasted."

Jade's look of concern relaxed under his touch, and a smile played over Double H's lips, but it was gone in the span of a heartbeat. He pulled his hand back as if he had touched a hot coal, and a deep blush rose instantly from his neck to his forehead. Ducking his head, he stammered, "That is – I – you...the kids! – it's not a waste of time at all to spend time with...them!"

Amusement washed over Jade's face, obliterating the last signs of worry. It was amazingly sweet how embarrassed Double H was to reveal his love for the children. She was naggingly aware that there was another level to his self-consciousness, and she made a mental note to come back to this moment later. In the meantime, overwhelmed with the urge to renew contact, she leaned over and brushed the hair out of his eyes and put her hand on his knee. He stiffened abruptly. "You're welcome here any time, Double H, but I hope you knew that already," she said gently, and he relaxed under her touch.

Suddenly serious, Jade turned her eyes on him with an alarming intensity. "Double H, will you promise me something?"

"Of course, Miss Jade. Anything," he swore instantly.

"If the children are in danger, will you protect them – no matter what the threat?"

"With my life, Miss Jade, and without hesitation. I'd think you would know that by now."

"Even if the threat...was me?" Jade dropped her gaze, unable to maintain eye contact, and bit her lip with nervousness.

Double H clenched his jaw. Seeing Jade so uncertain of her own goodness tore him up inside, but it also made him furious. He breathed deeply, making certain that he had control of his voice, and replied gently but with immovable weight: "Jade. No."

Surprised, she glanced back up and recoiled from the force and intensity of his gaze. "But what if I..."

"No. It won't happen, Jade. You love those children." He could see that simple platitudes would get nowhere, so reluctantly but determinedly he dove into the heart of the matter. "Jade, there's clearly a connection between you and the DomZ."

Jade winced, but nodded. "Exactly – I'm broken. I'm dangerous. And if it ever comes down to it, I want you to..."

"No. Let me finish. It is never going to happen. You are not going to turn on the kids, or me, or IRIS. You have the best heart of anyone I've ever known. I have seen you fight against being put under DomZ control...and win. You expelled their high priest from your mind and vanquished him single-handed. Jade, you are not predestined for evil. You are not a DomZ monster in human form. You are my friend, my partner, my compatriot, and I will never raise a hand against you. You will never make me have to."

As his mouth shaped his thoughts into actual sound waves and he heard his feelings vocalized for the first time, he realized that he believed them entirely. He trusted Jade without question. It wasn't rational, it wasn't logical; but he did, and he had never been more certain of anything. Jade wasn't the IRIS traitor.

Invigorated by his own unshakeable faith in her, he continued: "But there _is_ someone that we need to protect the children – and ourselves – from. Our cell of IRIS has a mole, and I need your help to smoke them out."

That caught her attention. "A...a mole? An informant? But how...are you _certain_?!"

"I am." With a sense of sudden and profound relief at finally having a confidante, Double H adjusted his body on the sun-warmed rock, and prepared himself to tell her the entire story. "Tell me...do you remember Fehn Digler?"

- - -

Standing outside of the lighthouse, toolbox in hand, Nino squinted into the setting sun. Jade and Double H were sitting beneath the lone, tall tree, conferring in hushed tones with grim expressions on their faces. He walked towards them, and as he neared, Jade looked up and tensed slightly. Nino saw her flick her eyes to Double H, who immediately stopped talking and turned to face him. 

"Nino!" Jade greeted him suddenly, with what sounded distinctly like forced cheer. "Are you done for the day? How did it go today?" She grinned, and if the cheer wasn't forced, the smile definitely was. Nino found himself instantly wary. What had they been discussing?

"Yes, we've wrapped up for the night," he confirmed. "No problems today, everything is going very smoothly. We should even be done with the transmitter ahead of schedule."

At that news, Double H broke into a wide, natural smile. "Fantastic, Nino!" he said in that stentorian way he had. "More good work from the boys at IRIS!" He continued to beam, and Nino couldn't help but feel patronized by the older man. Even when sitting, Double H managed to make Nino feel like he was being looked down upon.

Jade stood gracefully, her athletic body moving with an unconscious ease. Double H followed suit with more power but considerably less grace. Jade laid a hand on Nino's arm gently, and met his eyes with hers. "Nino, could you give Double H a ride home tonight? We're having some trouble with the hovercraft."

Concentrating on keeping his voice even and free of bitterness, Nino expressed his eager willingness to do so for his comrade. He smiled at Double H, the gesture as forced as Jade's had been a moment earlier. Whatever was going on between her and the big lug, he didn't like it at all, and couldn't help but resent the Byronic buffoon for being the one she chose to trust.

- - -

As the lights of the pedestrian district raced across the open sea to meet Nino's hummercraft, Hub watched the signs of the shops zip past them, blurred from speed. Nino cut the engine, and the craft began to slow and bounce gently with the waves. The signs came into focus, and one in particular caught Hub's eye. 

"Double H, I'm going to have to drop you off a bit further from your loft than usual," Nino said brusquely. "Let's say, Canal and Skyline?"

"That's fine, fine..." Hub muttered, and then made a spontaneous decision. "Actually, no! Just drop me here! No need to go out of your way at all!"

Nino glanced over, brow furrowed with confusion, and for a fleeting instant Hub thought he saw a hint of guilt flit over his young and earnest face. "Sure, Double H," he responded, "Here it is." He steered the bulky vessel into the small berth, and Hub vaulted onto the dock and gaily thanked him for the ride before setting off eagerly back the way they had just came.

"What time do I need to pick you up tomorrow?" Nino yelled after him.

Hub turned and with a jaunty grin replied, "No need, good man! Goodnight!" and continued on toward the hovercraft dealership, eyes riveted adoringly on the gleaming curves of a silver Stingray IV.


	8. The Horns of a Dilemma

We learn a bit more about Double H in this chapter. I'm always a bit nervous to add in non-canonical backstory to the characters, so I hope no one minds that I've given him a "real name" to explain his nicknames.

As always, the characters are not mine; that honor belongs to Michel Ancel's brain and Ubisoft's pursestrings. I am but a mad puppeteer, only capable of claiming the actions I put them through as my fingers twitch their little strings.

* * *

**Chapter 8  
The Horns of a Dilemma**

Over the past few weeks, this had become a daily ritual for Jade; skimming across the Hillyan sea from one side of the Canal City archipelago to the other, she and Double H gazing out across the waves in companionable silence. They were making the trip today in his gleaming new silver Stingray hovercraft, so they were limited to gliding across the surface of the sea itself rather than soaring above in the Beluga. It was oddly peaceful to return to the manner of transportation to which she was so accustomed, although it did mean sacrificing the speed of an airborne craft.

Today had been forecast to be hazy and they were in a sector notorious for its heavy fogging, and true to its reputation the fog clung thickly here to the sea, transforming this band of islands into a strange and ghostly place. Up on the isles themselves the fog diminished, but out on the open sea the blank white world was dizzyingly void of any points of reference. Double H piloted the hovercraft with much less speed than it was capable of, and Jade had set the craft's collision-detector to full strength.

With no scenery to watch for amusement, Jade's mind was wandering madly. She focused on Double H, the only interesting subject at hand, and her train of thought was instantly fueled by curiosity. She had heard both Meï and Hahn call him Hub, but she knew him only by his code name. Neither Hub nor Double H was a usual name, and Jade wondered whether Hub might also be a nickname.

"So what does Double H stand for, anyway?" she asked suddenly.

To her extreme amusement and chagrin, he turned crimson. The blush rose from his neck and spread in record time to his ears, lighting them up like mortified little beacons. "I'm sorry, I'm prying," she blurted. "It's none of my business, I was just...curious."

He cracked a rueful smile. "It's quite all right. It's just that...I go by a nickname for a reason." He rubbed one of his flaming ears self-consciously. "My name isn't exactly what I would have chosen for myself, and back in the military I needed to command respect. My real name is not what I would call tactically advantageous in achieving that goal."

"C'mon, partner, it can't be that bad."

"Harlan Hubstacle," he revealed solemnly, "and my middle name is Hubert – but don't you dare tell the boys from IRIS!"

Try as she could, Jade couldn't hold back a snicker. "That is pretty awful," she admitted. "I can see why you go by Double H – or maybe I should start calling you 'Triple H?'"

"Actually," he coughed, blushing again; "You've probably noticed...my friends call me Hub. 'Double H' is just my IRIS code name. I would be honored, if, uh..."

Jade grinned widely. "No problemo...Hub. And I promise, your secret is safe with me." Hub grinned back, but her comment had reminded Jade of the dark reality they faced. "Which leads me to wonder...which of our friends is it that our secrets aren't safe with anymore? I have such a hard time believing that any of them could be an informant!"

"I know," Hub agreed, his demeanor abruptly serious. "It's a terrible feeling, not being able to trust one's own comrades."

"At least there are only so many suspects," Jade said practically, "and only so many of us that are vulnerable."

Hub looked up at her sharply, and shook his head. "I keep forgetting how new you are to IRIS. It is extremely unorthodox for someone as recently joined as you are to be so high on our totem pole."

"What do you mean?"

"IRIS has several cells on Hillys. Ours is the one they all communicate through. There's a large viewscreen in our den at Akuda that, before our signal was broken, we could use to communicate with the majority of our correspondents – both on Hillys and beyond."

"I remember Hahn showing that to me the first time I was ever in the den," Jade mentioned. It had only been a few weeks ago, for all that it felt like a lifetime away.

"Exactly. That's bizarre for IRIS. We take extreme precautions most of the time, and if the situation hadn't been so desperate, you never would have had access to that sort of information without having proven yourself through years of service."

"I didn't realize that we'd been in such dire straits when Hahn approached me," Jade admitted, slightly confused.

Hub met her eyes, and she saw grief in them as he responded: "The Canal City cell had taken a terrible hit. The Alpha Sections had realized that we were the staging point for all IRIS operations on Hillys, and they focused their attentions on us. We had lost all of our field operatives but myself, and if it hadn't been for you, I too would have died in the factory where you found me. Hahn took a great risk and defied our Chief – your uncle – in recruiting you so quickly, and I'm eternally grateful that he did."

"Huh," she said simply, trying to take the new information in stride. "So exactly how bad is it that we have a rat?"

Hub sighed deeply and gripped the control panel until his knuckles were white. "Terrible. Almost every IRIS agent and ally on Hillys is in danger, and many in other systems could be at risk as well. The governor, Bakubar Mammago, Nouri--"

"No!" Jade gasped. "Not Nouri!"

"Exactly," Hub sighed. "There will be a great many lives at risk until we weed out the scum betraying us. And that scum just happens to be one of my only friends."

Appalled by the magnitude of the problem at hand, Jade sat in silence as she tried to digest the facts. She'd had no idea that she'd been trusted with so much sensitive information so quickly.

As the sun reached its zenith, some of the fog began to burn off, and Jade spotted the island marked on the map just as the hovercraft's audible alert was triggered. What she could see of it looked peaceful enough, but she had been lulled into complacency before. Using her camera's telephoto lens as a telescope, she searched the island's gently sloping, verdant fields and oddly rocky shore for any sign of foul play.

"Hub, what was the note attached to this one again?" she asked with a slight sense of unease. The place looked perfectly peaceful–too peaceful. She didn't want to be taken off guard again, as they had been with the water-strider monster.

Hub flicked open a holo-reader and his brow furrowed as he read the notation. "This one is quite recent. A fisherman called it in just yesterday. He reported having seen a 'horrible, horned beast' burst out of the fog on this island as he was checking his banska traps off-shore. Apparently he was far enough from land that he escaped alive."

"So this one is a land monster." Jade lowered her camera, her face drawn into an expression of unease. "I don't think we're going to be able to get the hovercraft onto that island; the shoreline is too vertical. We'll have to go on foot." She looked at her companion and made a face. "This oughta be...interesting."

Hub prepared to go, but observing Jade's stance and facial expression, he hesitated. The bulk of the island seemed to consist of gently sloping, grass-covered hills, but it dropped off suddenly into the ocean. Jade was right; the hovercraft wouldn't make it up the short cliff, which would leave them without its guns and protection. "We could abort the mission and return with one of the Hillyan Army's ships. 'No amount of firepower is ever overkill,' Carlson and Peeters, page 75. I'm sure the Governor could spare one for the afternoon."

Uncertainty flickered across Jade's face, but it was gone almost before it registered. "No," she said resolutely, "We're already here, and I don't want to owe any more favors to the Governor." Hub nodded his agreement, steering the hovercraft in towards the coast where he could anchor it securely, and without further ado they set out across the rugged beach.

The cliff rose straight out of the beach, but it was short and fairly easy to climb. After a brief scramble, they stood on the pastoral landscape of the island itself. Tendrils of fog engulfed the coastline, as if incorporeal fingers were trying to drag the land into the sea. They climbed the hill before them, weapons out and all senses searching for any sign of their enemy.

Their hill turned out to be the tallest point on the island, and from its summit, they could see all of the isle that wasn't obscured by haze. There was clearly a small lake in the center of the island, because dense, impenetrable fog writhed there like a living thing. Jade stared into it intently, and she swore that if she focused hard enough, she could feel...something.

"There's something there." She turned to Hub for affirmation. "Can you feel it? Something is alive down there...something big."

Hub glared into the haze as if willing it to reveal its secrets, but after a few moments shook his head and shrugged. "I can't feel a thing, Miss Jade."

Before he had even closed his mouth, an oddly animalistic groaning noise emanated from the valley, as if being uttered by many mouths simultaneously. Jade and Hub turned to one another and grimly drew their weapons. As silently as they could, they descended into the mist, separating as they went so that they could flank the enemy.

Jade's sense of foreboding increased exponentially with her distance from Double H..._no, it's_ Hub _now,_ she reminded herself stubbornly. It was a sound plan to split up, but she didn't like it. She and Hub worked so well together that she was starting to miss his presence when working alone. A hint of a foul odor began to accost her senses, and, involuntarily recollecting the stench of the rotting DomZ sea-serpent corpse and the disgusting creatures that had fed on it, she gulped nervously as the stink intensified until it felt like she was nearly on top of its source.

The fog had thickened so completely that she could no longer even see her feet. Robbed of her sight, she stretched out the sense that had earlier alerted her to the presence of something big. Now that she was closer to it, it had begun to feel more like several smaller presences – dozens and dozens of them – and her heart pounded uncomfortably as she continued to draw on the memory of the pack of Anglerus Subterranus that had almost cost them their lives to escape.

Jade's senses and nerves pushed to their extremes, she gasped out loud when she stepped in something soft, squishy, and decidedly noxious. She bent to examine it, and with a sudden mix of relief and frustration identified the awful smell surrounding her. She had just stepped in a cow pie. She and Double H were in a manure-filled pasture, blindly hunting cows – or as the skittish fisherman who had registered this complaint had put it, "hideous, horned creatures." She couldn't help but let out an exasperated groan.

- - -

Hub had been growing more and more uneasy since he and Jade had parted ways. It had seemed like a good idea at the time, but the situation felt more and more wrong the further from her he went. A terrible stench hung over this place, and he, too, replayed terror-streaked memories of the underground horrors they had fought earlier in the week. 

_What was I thinking, letting her talk me into dividing our forces?_ Hub derided himself, edgy from fear for Jade's safety. _"W.W.T.A.O.: We Work Together As One." Carlson & Peeters, page 823. _

Moving slowly and silently forwards, navigating through the thickening fog by distant treetops, Hub's nerves were jangling. Every muscle was tense. And then, far off to his right, he heard Jade gasp...and then moan, as if in pain. Terror filled him. Had she been attacked and injured, with him too far away to help?

Hub let out an earth-shaking battlecry as he charged into the fray: "_CARLSON AND PEETERS_!", terrifying the five dozen cattle between him and Jade. They stampeded before him, but caught up in adrenaline and his own overactive imagination, Hub was only aware of the earth thundering as if a giant creature was moving about. Finally he broke out of the fog, and took in the absurd scene before him.

"They're cows, Hub...we're on a wild goose chase!" Jade yelled from the fog behind him.

Confused and disoriented, he deactivated his energy field, put away his T-hammer, and removed his helmet to scratch his head.

And then he heard an unfamiliar voice cry out above the mooing of the cows in indignant rage: "Sweet jumpin' jehosephat, drat yer worthless hoodlum hides! Jeb Tanner, if that be ye, I'm gonna fork ye so hard yer da'll be hearin' yer bawlin' from the next islet over! What heve these pore cows ever done to deserve yer mischief?! Pore things er gonna milk sour fer a fortnight!"

Hub pieced together all of the information at hand, and realized with chagrin that he had just chased a herd of domesticated cattle through impenetrable fog for no reason whatsoever. He was turning to bellow a shame-faced apology when the voice sounded out again: "Ach, now I've got ye!"

Jade's cry of pain followed on its heels, and Hub's heart leapt into his throat in fear. "JADE!" he cried, and dove back into the fog without even stopping to grab his helmet.


	9. First Betrayal

Are everyone's fingers sore from hanging off that cliff for the past couple of weeks? Sorry! I just started a new job and have had rather less time for writing. I think I'm going to start trying to write on the train to/from work and see how well that works out, because otherwise I have no idea where I'll find the time.

Hillys and the usual suspects are fragments of Michel Ancel's imagination and neatly confined to Ubisoft's wallet (damn them). But if you're looking for someone to blame for this storyline, that sin is entirely upon my head. :-)

* * *

**Chapter 9  
The First Betrayal**

Hub tore through the fog. It wrapped clammy fingers around him as he ran as if struggling to hold him back. "Jade!" her name was wrenched from him, not of conscious intent, but from sheer need to hear her voice again. How would he ever find her in this soup?

"Ach, what 'eve I done?" Hub heard the unfamiliar voice groan in terror. "Yore jest a wee lass!" It had come from no more than thirty feet ahead. Hub's heart sank as he sprinted on, and he feared for the worst as Jade burst into his view, stumbling backwards. He caught her just as she fell, and gasped to see four bleeding punctures in her abdomen. He tore his eyes from her wounds to see if there was still danger, but the only thing visible was an old dairy farmer with guilty horror in his eyes, dropping an ancient, newly bloodied pitchfork to the ground.

The farmer looked up and met Hub's eyes. "Quick lad, git the bairn an' follow me," he croaked, and turned into the fog. Hub scooped Jade up and cradled her to his chest gently, taking care that her head would not bang against his armor as he jogged behind the old man.

"Jade – Selene's Seas, are you alright?" he asked urgently, daring a glance into her endless green eyes. She turned her head to meet his glance, and he nearly stumbled before he ripped his eyes away and back to the old man guiding him through the fog.

"I suddenly know how Pey'j feels about pork kebabs," she wisecracked, and then winced in pain. "And I think it may be...highly practical...to get these holes cleaned," she gasped while trying to smile. Hub grimaced, trying desperately not to think about what manner of filth had been encrusted on that pitchfork.

The fog thinned to gradually reveal a thickly grassed landscape with a single ramshackle hut. The farmer was making an arthritic beeline for it, and Hub winced at how unsanitary it was doomed to be. "We'll need clean water to boil, and spirits," he shouted to his guide as they neared the hut.

The old man nodded as he opened the door, and gestured to a straw pallet on the floor. "Put yer lass on me bed," he directed, and pulled a half-empty bottle of Gaznian firewater from a shelf. "'Ere's the spirits," he grunted as he shoved the bottle towards Hub, and then made his way to the fire to heat the water.

Hub laid Jade on the pallet as gently as he could and cast a grim, disapproving eye around the dingy shack. It was an absolute hovel, with dirt floors and grimy surfaces and, incongruously, a large and relatively new viewscreen that had been left on, blaring the news. He began to remove his armor; the cleanest cloth in the whole hut was probably his own shirt, and he had to get Jade's wounds cleaned. As he stripped off his shirt, he heard her gasp.

"Hub!" she cried as she struggled to sit up, wincing in pain.

Hub looked up, alarmed at her cry, and then saw the subject of her gaze. She was staring at his torso, where numerous scars zig-zagged in cruel white streaks across his tanned olive skin.

"Mine have already healed, Miss Jade," he said softly, gently pushing her back into the bed. "Let's worry about yours for the moment."

She quieted, but her eyes continued to survey the harsh souvenirs of his capture and torture during the Thaïr campaign, and Hub knew that at some point she would be asking questions that he wasn't certain he was ready to answer. He tried to keep his chest to her so she couldn't see the brutal marks that the savagely violent beatings had left across his shoulder blades. He busied himself with tearing strips from his shirt and doused one in the potent alcohol the old man had provided.

Hub returned to Jade with the sanitized cloth, and realized that her shirt had been drawn into the punctures and would have to be removed in order for him to treat the wounds. Unable to see her body in a fully clinical light, he felt the warmth of a blush burn his ears for the second time that day. He cleared his throat nervously: "I will have to cut your shirt free of the wounds," he said, his voice cracking like a boy's.

"Of course," Jade replied, cringing in anticipation of pain. Hub slipped a small knife from his boot and took a deep breath as he carefully slit her shirt up the middle. He released the breath in relief when he realized she was wearing a breast band, and tenderly lifted the ruined fabric from the punctures.

"This will sting," he warned apologetically as he prepared to press the alcohol-soaked rag to her gut, "But it's infinitely preferable to the alternative." He looked to Jade's eyes for permission and she nodded assent, but he saw the nervous anticipation in her face. He placed the cloth carefully and applied firm pressure to stop the slow trickle of blood, and from the corner of his eye he saw Jade bite her lip.

"Yon water is boilin'," the old man announced, and hovered just out of the way. "I canna' tell ye how sorry I am," he said, wringing his hands. "Yon cattle er my livelihood, an' I've hed bandits scairin' 'em sech as they no longer milk, an' Jeb Tanner 'es stolen twa of 'em this moon past," he ranted.

"Don't worry," Jade reassured him, smiling weakly. "Hub knows what he's doing, and I heal real fast."

Hub cleared his throat again, fighting off another blush. He turned his face to the old man, and directed him to boil the strips of cloth from his shirt, and to rub his knife down with alcohol. The old man began to do so, and Hub returned his attention to Jade to find her studying his face carefully.

"Is it bad?" she asked quietly.

Hub met her earnest gaze, and told her the truth: "It's not good. It will take quite a while to heal completely, and we have to be extremely cautious of infection. The punctures may be deep enough to go septic but I don't think any of your organs were hit. As long as we get you to a doctor soon, you'll wind up fairly badly scarred, but you shouldn't be crippled." He squeezed her hand reassuringly, and she nodded bravely.

"This next part will be more painful than the first," he warned her frankly. "Would you take some of the firewater for the pain?" He watched her face and saw her weighing the options.

"Yes," she responded simply, and held out her hand for the bottle, then yelped in agony as her motion put stress on the wounds.

"Easy now," he reminded her, and directed her hand to the cloth around her midsection. "You keep pressure on that, and I'll help you sit up to drink." He lifted her tenderly and held the bottle to her lips, tipping it slowly to let a trickle of the potent liquid run into her mouth. She took several swigs and Hub removed the bottle.

"Sweet god, that's awful!" Jade wheezed, grimacing, "...but I guess there's no sense wasting good Hyernan whiskey on me right now."

Soon the makeshift bandages were boiled and cool enough to touch, and Hub carefully cleaned the wounds with them. With the knife, he skillfully picked out all of the foreign matter that he could, and after swabbing the punctures with the firewater, he wrapped her abdomen tightly with the remaining strips of his shirt.

"We had better get you to Doc Cauble now, so that he can treat you properly." Hub strapped his armor back on, clammy against his bare skin.

Jade tried again to sit up, and a cry of agony burst from her lips. "It hurts," she confessed with a slight slur. "I think...you had better carry me back to the Stingray."

Hub bundled her back into his arms, and they had just begun to leave when the news on the viewscreen switched stories.

"_Moving on from the population study, we have a special guest back with us at HTV. Our ex-correspondent Fehn Digler has a special announcement to make. Fehn?"_

"_Thank you, Daja," _that too-familiar, oily voice oozed from the viewscreen, and Jade and Hub looked at one another grimly. The old man seemed interested too, and he turned the volume up.

"_I am reporting today from an undisclosed location for my own safety with a story that I hope will redeem my reputation," _Digler continued. _"My credibility suffered a terrible blow when it was revealed that the Alpha Sections had duped us all, but I am here to atone for my gullibility."_

"_Duped _him? He was their sleazy little lapdog!" Jade protested, squirming in Hub's arms.

Digler continued: _"Hillyan authorities have captured IRIS sympathizer and propagandist Ming Tzu. He was responsible for distributing illicit terrorist communications printed by a publishing ring located out of his luxury goods shop in the pedestrian district of Canal City. The arrest was based on information brought to the authorities by myself, working in coalition with a secret informant. I will be bringing you more information right here at HTV as we receive it," _he announced. _"Back to you, Daja," _he finished as Jade cried out in anger.

"The weasel! That draz-gatted little rat! That's a stinking pile of crochax dung!"

The old man considered for a moment, and then cut in on her stream of curses: "I dunno, lass. I 'ad written' off yon Digler after the Alphas proved to be trait'rous, but if the fella can root out them scabrous IRIS dogs, 'e's a friend o' mine."

Hub and Jade shared a horrified glance as the old man continued his tirade: "I tell ye, if'n I ever find out who's in that demned IRIS, I'll make yon scratch I gave ye look like a bug sting! Bastards tried ta give us oop to yon DomZ on a silver platter!"

Hub quietly took their leave, and he carried Jade back to the cliff in front of the Stingray in silence.

"Miss Jade, you'll have to ride piggy-back for the descent," Hub mentioned softly as they reached the seaside bluffs. Jade nodded, and once she was on his back he climbed down the cliff to the rocky beach and carried her the rest of the way to the hovercraft. In a black mood, they set off for Doc Cauble's home.

"I had no idea," she whispered. "I had no idea at all that they hated us so much."

Hub nodded gravely. "And now there's someone who's willing to dig us a mass grave by turning us over to Digler at a moment's notice."

"Poor Ming Tzu," Jade murmured, as memories of her friend and political sympathizer flashed through her mind's eye. All he had done was provide information. He had only ever wanted the good of the Hillyan people. It was wrong for him to be punished for his actions, Jade thought passionately – very, very wrong.

- - -

By the time Hub and Jade reached Doc Cauble's house on the edge of the pedestrian district, the sun was already slipping behind the horizon for the night. Hub pulled the Stingray onto the beach beneath Doc's porch and leapt from the hovercraft and raced to the other side to assist Jade, but she was already standing on her own. 

"Miss Jade!" Hub looked horrified. "You shouldn't be exerting yourself yet!"

She took a few steps. "It doesn't really hurt anymore."

"That must just be the adrenaline speaking. Please, be careful!"

"Right," she said distractedly. "It tingles a little, but there really isn't any pain anymore." She walked by herself to Doc Cauble's door, which Hub pounded on insistently until a small, wizened man opened the door.

"Good heavens, good heavens, so much racket," Doc Cauble muttered. "Hub, Jade, oh dear, what brings the two of you here so urgently?" He straightened his half-moon glasses on his slightly bulbous nose and looked them over with his sharp little eyes, taking in the makeshift bandages around Jade's torso. He continued before either could cut in to explain. "Mmphm, must be the girl, eh? Bring her in, bring her in. Put her on the table, that's a good lad." He stepped back, allowing them in and gesturing to a large solid oak table that was neatly covered with a thick quilt for padding.

"What's all this about, then?" the doctor asked firmly as he approached Jade and began checking her vitals.

"Pitchfork wound, mid-abdomen," Hub started to explain as Doc peeled away the bandages. "Basic field dressing, alcohol debridement, and I got her here as quickly as poss..." Hub stared in disbelief as Doc removed the last layer of the cloth strips to reveal Jade's almost unmarred belly. "What in Selene's deepest crater..." he whispered in awe. The four wounds that had only two hours ago been gruesome and serious were now only minor gouges. It was as if a full month of healing had passed within the span of their speedy return from the fog isles. Hub's jaw dropped in utter awe and confusion, and he reached out to touch the tiny punctures as if to reassure himself of their reality.

"What is it? Is it bad?" Jade demanded fearfully, concerned by Hub's awed reaction. She sat and peered down at her belly. "Oh," she said simply, and, like Hub, ran her fingers over the healthily scarred blemishes, daring her fingers to disprove the absurd sight.

Doc Cauble, oblivious to their astonishment, straightened his glasses and leaned in for a closer look. "Mmphm, now, what have we here? Why didn't you come in when you got these, hmm?" He poked and prodded at the scabs with care, and peered at Jade over his spectacles. "These are nearly healed, child. You have no need for me. There's no infection or any other complications, and I rather doubt you'll even scar."

A bit miffed at being called upon at home for such a trivial thing, Doc hustled Hub and Jade back out into the dimming night with various absent-minded pleasantries, and in a stunned state they bid him good night. As the door shut behind them, Jade began to babble.

"How is this possible? It-it isn't. It just isn't possible. I don't...no, I-I don't understand!" she rambled, shaken to her core. "Hub, tell me I'm not crazy. It was worse than this. It was bad."

"It was. I don't fully comprehend the situation either," Hub confirmed, hesitated, and then continued warily: "...but it's not the only miraculous thing I've seen you do."

"What do you mean?" Jade demanded.

"You brought the Chief back to life, Miss Jade," Hub reminded her gently. "He was dead. It was physically impossible, but I saw you do it. This appears to be a similar occurrence."

Jade's eyes narrowed. "Pey'j," she said suddenly. "Pey'j knows something, and I'm tired of waiting for him to tell me what it is." She stalked to the hovercraft, every line of her posture punctuated with indignant resentment. "Let's go get some answers."

- - -

Pey'j wasn't in the hangar when they arrived at the lighthouse, and Jade stormed into his workshop crackling with righteous outrage. Pey'j looked up in surprise from the complicated piece of machinery he'd been tinkering with and gaped at her. 

"Jade! Sweet Jesus, we were worried sick! Where have you been?" he cried.

Jade slammed her hand onto his workbench hard enough to knock a hammer to the floor. "Wrong question, Uncle Pey'j. The right question is: Why are you alive? Why am I walking around as if I hadn't just had a pitchfork rammed halfway through me a few hours ago? I'm not going to wait any longer, Uncle. Tell me what you know."


	10. The Present

Several people have expressed amazement that I spend so much time and effort on writing this story. They don't understand why I would go to such lengths to produce something from which I can never benefit monetarily -- I don't own the main characters, Hillys, the DomZ, etc. The storyline is mine, but it is intrinsically tied to Michel Ancel's world, so I can't do much with it besides post it here. But I don't care -- that's not why I write.

I write to learn how to write.

At first, I was writing this story because I had an idea that wouldn't leave me alone. It demanded attention. It begged, pleaded, wheedled. So I began to write, doing the best that I could with the knowledge I had.

Since then, I have learned more about the art of the written word, and I like to think that I have improved. I've just made a small round of stylistic edits to previous chapters, and I will probably rehaul them later, but for now I'm just going to continue writing.

A few people have asked me for advice on their own fics, and a couple have asked how I learned to write. I never really did, in all honesty -- I've never taken a writing course in my life. I've read voraciously my whole life, which I'm sure helps. And the more I write, the better I'm forced to become. When I realise that I've just typed "He looked at her" or "He turned to face her" or "He met her gaze" for the umpteenth time in a single conversation, I know I'm doing something wrong and have to come up with a new way of doing things.

But at some point, I hit a wall. I had improved about as much as I was going to with the knowledge that I had. So I began seeking outside help. The '**Tricks and Tips: "Help me with dialogue, you douche!"**' thread in The Furnace has helped me immeasurably for this chapter. In the past I have definitely been guilty of the use-every-synonym-for-'said' style of writing dialogue, and I hope and believe that this chapter is proof that I am improving as an author. I've also requested someone to read my story and give me some concrit (constructive criticism) (thanks in advance, Maiafey!).

But enough of the thinky stuff. Pop quiz time!

The best time to research the probable severity of pitchfork wounds is:  
A. right before bed  
B. right before dinner  
C. none of the above

As it turns out, if the tines make it through the skin, things get nasty _fast_.

* * *

**Chapter 10  
The Present**

Jade's face burned with the heat of her blood, and her jaw ached from being held so stiffly. So focused was she on Pey'j that she nearly jumped when a female voice interjected from behind.

"Yes, Chief – I think we could _all_ benefit from that explanation," Meï echoed softly. It was then Jade realized that the entire IRIS cell was there. Nino was standing with his mouth agape, holding a transistor absent-mindedly. Hahn and Peepers were crowded around a small table, and

Meï was sitting nearby with a massive tome open in her lap, a notepad covered in meticulous notes, and reading glasses sliding down her nose.

Hahn pushed out his chair and stood. "I, too, am curious to hear those revelations." He held up a hand as if to forestall Jade from interjecting. "However, we have a more...immediate problem."

"Ming Tzu, yes, we heard," Jade interrupted impatiently, in spite of Hahn's gesture. "But I..."

"We've been tryin' to get a hold of you all afternoon!" Pey'j cried out of the blue, as if suddenly released from paralysis. "Why didn't you answer yer messages?"

"Messages?" Jade furrowed her brow. She reached down to activate her SAC, but it was dead., one of the wires pulled completely loose. "That evil little man must have broken it when he stabbed me."

"_Stabbed _you?" Nino took a step towards her and reached out a hand, his face full of concern. "Jade, are you..."

"I'm _fine_," she snapped, tossing the broken SAC on the table and turning to stare at Pey'j. "Which is _exactly _why I want some answers!"

With that, the room was still. Before everyone could begin to babble again, Hub stepped forwards. "Since we are all here, perhaps it would be best for us to discuss our security breach."

"But –" Jade gestured at her stomach with impatience written on her face.

Hub squeezed her shoulder gently. "We will get to that, Miss Jade. I give you my word I'll see to it." He searched her eyes for approval. She nodded slightly, conveying her tacit acceptance.

Hub glanced around the group of comrades. "Now, what has already been discussed?" He pulled out a chair for Jade and perched himself gingerly on a rickety wooden stool.

Hahn sighed deeply. His face was pulled with stress in a way that magnified every wrinkle. He hadn't shaven in several days, and some of the hairs at his temples was coming in gray."Ming Tzu was the main distributor of our newsletter for Canal City. Practically everyone in IRIS on this side of Hillys has gone to him for information or supplies. Any one of them could have betrayed him, or it's quite possible that an outsider found him out."

Meï nodded, closing her book. "There's no way to narrow it down. It could be absolutely anyone."

Jade pursed her lips in frustration – she and Hub both knew that, far from being utterly unknown, the traitor was either the Governor herself or someone in this very room. She glanced at Hub. He met her gaze and made the subtlest of gestures, moving his head minutely from side to side. She frowned, but nodded faintly to acknowledge his desire to keep their knowledge unspoken.

"You should've followed my damn advice," Pey'j exploded, his ire focused on Hahn. "If you'd've followed some basic secrecy procedures, we wouldn't be in this draz-gatted mess, and Ming Tzu wouldn't be in jail!"

Hahn sat unnaturally still, the tension around his mouth visible. "So you've mentioned. Repeatedly. But that mistake is not one we can fix at this point." His voice was cool, but tinged with a hint of sorrow.

"Vorax-flogging bumbling Hillyan hicks," Pey'j muttered underneath his breath.

Peepers snorted around his pipe. "Well, it doesn't take a blind man to see that we've been a bit ham-handed with our security..."

Pey'j looked offended. "Ham...? Hey!"

Feigning obliviousness, Peepers continued, "...but as Hahn said, it's too late to fix past mistakes. What we need now is some damage control."

"As I've said, this may be an isolated incident." Meï capped her pen and shifted in her chair to a more comfortable position. "Our security hasn't been the best, true, but Ming Tzu was the only IRIS contact some of our operatives had. We have _extremely _strict standards for people we trust with the identities of our agents," she paused and glanced at Jade, "...with very few exceptions." Jade felt her ears going red and her stomach flipped uncomfortably.

"You _can't _be...are you accusing Jade?" Nino stared at Meï incredulously. "She's been invaluable to us!"

Meï rolled her eyes and crossed her arms. "I'm not accusing anyone."

Hub cleared his throat. "It certainly seemed like you were implying –"

"I wasn't implying anything!" Meï spat bitterly, turning on him. "But you know as well as I do that she didn't go through the same process as –"

"Enough!" Pey'j bellowed. "I raised Jade m'self. Any questions pertainin' to her character can be raised to me. Any of you geniuses got an actually useful idea, or should I send you housewives home?" He stood with his hands on his hips, surveying the sea of shamed faces before him. No one spoke. "That's what I thought. Now if y'all don't mind, I'd like to speak with my niece alone," he announced, gesturing at the door.

Meï took a deep breath. "I really think it would be best if we _all _heard this explana–"

"I _said_, I'd like to speak with my niece. _Alone_."

So dismissed, the core Canal City IRIS members began to shuffle out of the room. Hub rose to leave, nodding a farewell to Jade. She grabbed his hand as he passed.

"Please stay," she whispered. Hub glanced at his chief. Pey'j rolled his eyes, but grunted an affirmative. Hub settled himself in a chair, and the three of them sat silently as the others filed out.

Once the workroom door had closed automatically behind the last to leave, Pey'j opened a drawer underneath his workbench and withdrew a small, wrapped package. He held it out to Jade with a nervous grin.

"Happy birthday, li'l miss."

Hub looked startled. "It's your birthday, Miss Jade?"

"Not 'til tomorrow." Jade glared at Pey'j and made no move to accept the proffered box. "Don't change the subject, Uncle Pey'j."

Pey'j harrumphed and dropped the gift unceremoniously into her lap. "I'm not," he snapped. "Open it."

Jade examined it for a moment, then tore away the wrappings with a single violent motion and opened the small box. She held up the picture frame within, and gasped. "Are these..."

"Yer parents, yes. Adam and Hanna." Pey'j paced the room several times, swallowing nervously. He wrung his hands and rubbed his left palm absentmindedly as he began. "I met them nearly thirty years ago on Sagittaria, through IRIS. Me'n yer father took to each other real quick – we were both mechanics, and we worked together on a bunch'a projects. Before too long, we were workin' on things together outside of IRIS too."

Jade tore her eyes from the picture of her parents and set it in her lap, her fingers lingering on the cool metal frame. "Like the Beluga?"

"Yes indeed, missy. The Beluga was our finest creation. Yer da got a real bug up his butt about makin' a spaceship 'bout the same time he joined the Order."

Hub jerked slightly, a look of wonder rushing over his face. He leaned forwards intently. "The Order? Would that be...the Order of Damocles?"

Pey'j turned his attention to Hub. His eyes narrowed as he responded, "Now where in tarnation would you've heard that name?"

"One of the IRIS field agents I used to work with. He was a little odd in the head, and I thought his stories were just that...stories," Hub marveled. "He spoke of a highly secretive organization that existed to keep some powerful weapon out of DomZ control."

"Well, that's disturbingly accurate," Pey'j grumbled. "Is he dead?"

"Yes. He was one of those that died in our first attempt to infiltrate the factory."

Pey'j nodded. "Good."

"_Good_?" Jade grimaced and sat bolt upright. "That's heartless!"

Pey'j studied her briefly before responding. "I dunno how that particular waste of breath found out about the Order, but if he was goin' around spoutin' that stuff, I cain't even begin to tell you the damage he could'a done."

Jade let out a disgusted noise. "Okay, well, clue me in. Why's this damn 'Order' so important, anyway?"

Pey'j heaved a great sigh, once again nervously rubbing his palm. He had been scratching it so roughly that the center of his hand was red and swollen. He looked Jade directly in the eyes and braced himself against his workbench. "Because the Order of Damocles exists to protect _you_."

"_What_?" Jade's eyes betrayed a mix of anger and disbelief. "I thought you said they were hiding a _weapon_ from the DomZ!"

Pey'j sighed deeply, his shoulders rounding and his eyes falling to the floor. He rubbed his head self-consciously and began to talk, not meeting her eyes. "I don't know it all. There are questions yer bound to have that I ain't going to have the answers to. But I guess it's only fair that I tell you what I know. Jest...try not to hate me too much."


	11. The Past

This has been a difficult chapter, and it is nowhere near good enough to justify having taken a year to produce. Oh wait, I'm sorry: TWO years. Jesus. There is not always an elegant way to do exposition, and this is a whole chapter full of it. In Pey'j's voice, which – well, let's just say that spell check and I are NOT on speaking terms right now.

This is where I must begin counting on my portrayal of the characters that we all know and love to be reward enough for you to stick with me as I stray even more dramatically from what Ancel & Co. have passed down as canon. This chapter is where I say, "Yes, Hillys is a fine and lovely place. Let's see how it fits into the universe, now, shall we?" and if the story is compelling enough, you will come with me. If I fail to write it enticingly enough, this is where I lose you all, and by waiting 2 years to publish this chapter, I'm pretty sure I've lost any momentum that would have made it easier to bring you all along.

I lay no claim to anything but the story. I adore the world and characters created by Michel Ancel and Ubisoft, and mean nothing but tribute to and appreciation of them in the writing of this sequel.

* * *

**Chapter 11**

**The Past**

Jade's face was flushed and her nostrils flared with every breath. Pey'j took a shocked step away from her fury, taking in her jutting chin and firey eyes. He could not recall a time he'd seen her this angry. His chest ached and he felt an urge to crawl under the table in shame; her anger was fearsome but justified. He had been keeping the truth from her for far too long.

Pey'j sighed deeply, his shoulders rounding and his eyes falling to the floor. The feeling of defeat swept over him in a sharp wave. He rubbed his head self-consciously and began to talk, incapable of meeting her eyes: "Like I was sayin', I met your parents on Sagittaria. Adam an' I built and fixed stuff, and Hanna was a field agent. One of the best."

Jade turned her eyes to the picture in her lap and traced her parents' faces with a trembling finger. Hub placed a hand on her shoulders and squeezed gently, looking at the photograph surreptitiously.

Without moving his gaze from the floor, Pey'j continued.

"Even though IRIS told us to keep our real lives secret, the three of us and your ma's partner, Hogan, were real tight. Hogan was the best man at their weddin', and me'n'Adam were inseparable. Always buildin' things together. The Beluga, now – she was our masterpiece." Here, Pey'j paused to let his eyes flicker over the schematics for the Beluga plastered on his workshop's walls, and for a moment the worry-lines around his mouth twitched into a vague smile.

The pig paused a moment and took a deep breath. Looking Jade over, he reached out his hand for a moment before pulling it back as if stuck by a pin.

"A bit less'n a year before you was born, a young man named Zak came to live with Adam an' Hanna. They introduced him as Hanna's cousin. He was a funny sorta fella – not quite right in the head, like, and real slow. Like a child in a man's body. But he had a spark to him. Liked kids, liked animals, liked to build things. I let him play with my tools sometimes, and he had a real knack for makin' things. Dumb as a rock though. Hogan couldn't stand him – the kid really freaked him out. I overheard Hogan yellin' at Hanna once 'bout how big a threat the kid was, an' I didn't really make much of it at the time – just thought he was bein' small-minded 'bout the poor kid. But it strained their friendship, an' I started seein' less and less of Hogan.

"Around the time Zak came to live with 'em, Adam got real jumpy. Hanna finally got pregnant – they'd been tryin' fer years – and your da started talkin' about what kind of world he wanted his baby to grow up in, an' how dangerous a child's life would be.

"It wasn't 'til a coupl'a months before you were born that he told me 'bout the Order. Zak had been with me in my workshop all day an' I'd been lettin' him build things, but at some point I forgot to watch him. Adam came by an' blew his lid when I said I didn't know where he was – when we found him, he was starin' into a pearl we had rigged up to a machine one of our science-types had been working on. She'd been tryin' to find a way to keep the pearls contaminated after the DomZ beast they'd come outta had been killed, so she could get to studyin' the DNA in 'em or some hogwash. But she'd never managed to have 'em hold onto more'n a coupl'a green streaks here and there.

"But there was Zak, starin' right in to this pearl that was glowin' green with patterns shiftin' all around like a livin' thing.

At this, Jade looked up from the photograph of her parents and studied Pey'j intently.

"Adam blew a gasket, knockin' Zak outta the way and bustin' the pearl into pieces. He tore me a new one for lettin' him outta my sight, yelled at Zak for wanderin' off, and finally sat down with his head in his hands. That's when he told me 'bout the Order. He told me that Zak was a Vessel, an' that Adam was sworn to protect him...or, more like, to protect the world from him."

Jade straightened her hunched posture and began fiddling with a loose thread in the seat of her chair. "A vessel of what? Why did the pearl affect him so? What damage was my father so worried about him doing?"

"Would you just be patient an' let me say my piece," Pey'j grumbled in exasperation. "This ain't easy as it is, li'l lady. Stop tryin' to jump ahead.

"I had a whole passel of questions for your da at that point. Questions like, 'a vessel of what? Why'd the pearl mess with him so bad? An' what damage could a sweet moon-brain like Zak do?'" Pey'j shot a glance at Jade, who reddened slightly around the ears at his heckling.

"So let's tackle the hardest one – the one that'll help explain the others," Pey'j continued slowly. He began pacing the room slowly, rubbing his hands together slowly, his face void of emotion.

"Zak was a Vessel. That's what Adam explained to me that day. The Order exists to watch over the Vessels – both to make sure they don't come to no harm an' that they don't do none – an' to make sure that if any harm comes to 'em that the Essence is passed on to a new Vessel."

Here he ceased his pacing, turned to face Jade, and looked her directly in the eye for the first time since he began his story.

"The Essence is the heart of all this damn mess," he said gravely, "and it's the part what I understand the least. So you're gonna have to trust me that I'm tellin' you what I can, here, an' that I'm willin' to help you learn more. But it ain't gonna make much sense to you, because I've been tryin' to understand it for over two decades an' I'm still confused as hell."

This disclaimer riveted Jade's attention; she met Pey'j's eyes and ceased her fidgeting. Behind her, Hub too froze into perfect stillness, hanging on every word.

"The Essence is a part of the DomZ queen that was taken from her a very long time ago. Without it, she ain't got her full strength nor abilities, an' she has spent the past 3,000 years trying to track it down. She has destroyed two worlds in the process an' enslaved untold hundreds of others. I don't know what would happen if she were to get it back, but I'd just as soon not find out.

"There's a race called 'the Old Ones' that took this Essence from her in the first place, an' who started the Order to keep it safe once they died out. To my knowledge they're all dead as doornails by now.

"But before they kicked the bucket, they figgered a way to capture this Essence in a human body, to keep it from returnin' to the DomZ queen and to make sure it don't get used as a weapon."

"So that's what I am," Jade said tonelessly. "A human body being used as some kind of protective sheath for an alien weapon."

"You're a draz-gatted victim, is what you are, and a damn survivor!" Pey'j said angrily. "You were never s'posed to be a Vessel. That was all because of...but I'm gettin' ahead of myself again. Let's back up to that day.

"So Adam told me about the Order, and I guess that was my induction. Hogan and Hanna were in on it too, but I shouldn't have ever been allowed to be. They're awful picky about their members, an' they look down on us Sus Sapiens and all the other 'working races'."

"Fanatic xenophobic nonsense," Hub muttered darkly.

"Well yeah, but not everywhere is as full of love and puppies as this nice little backward water world," Pey'j retorted. "We Fauna Sapiens may be accepted here, but there's worlds where we ain't no better off than slaves. So Hogan was right pissed off about Adam inducting me into the Order. They had a big fallin' out when he found out, and he requested a new assignment with IRIS. We didn't see him again until he came to warn us about the DomZ two months later."

Pey'j sighed heavily and ran his hand over the plans for the Beluga. "Lookin' back on it now, I'm fair sure it's all my fault," he said heavily. "It was Zak lookin' in that draz-gatted pearl when I wasn't paying no damn attention that must of gotten their attention focused on Sagittaria. We were pretty well prepared for them, as far as those things go, but come they did an' some of their sarcophagi came straight to us. Hogan beat them there by mere minutes, all outta breath an' lookin' like death warmed over, but he didn't get there in time for us to get Hanna out soon enough.

"She was so far pregnant that she hadn't been on missions in months, and was due to pop any day. We started for the Beluga right away, your parents, Hogan, me an' Zak, but it was too far to its hidin' place and she was movin' too slow. The DomZ caught up with us and went straight for Zak.

"Your da an' Hogan all but gave their lives protectin' Zak, and the rest of us did all we could. But they got him an' were takin' him away when Hogan shot him right in the head. Then he took out this old-as-hell-lookin' device, an' Adam and Hanna both started screamin' at him to stop what he was doin'...but his last act in life was to activate that thing. An' its sole purpose is to pass on the Essence from a dyin' vessel to a new one.

"He transferred that thing into Hanna, an' it took hold of you right in her belly. She went into labor right there.

"Adam an' I drove off the rest of the DomZ and just barely got Hanna to the Beluga in time. We left Saggitaria not knowin' where to go. You were born in space, an' yer parents decided the most important thing was to protect you. Adam was dyin', an' nothin' we could do was savin' him. Hanna was still weak from childbirth, an' knew that the DomZ would be followin' her since they'd seen Hogan transfer the Essence into her body. So she an' Adam decided to go out with a bang to buy me time to escape with you, so that your life could be spared...and so that the Vessel could be protected," he added reluctantly.

"We padded Hanna's belly and I dropped them off on a small, barely inhabited planet, an' they went off to start a false trail. You an' I went on to Artemis, where I began to raise ya. No one suspected us, on account of me bein' a Fauna – it was the perfect cover.

"An' on Artemis I waited. Found the IRIS chapter, started a new life, and waited for word from Hanna or Adam. I never gave up hope until one day someone from the Order showed up an' let me know that they were dead.

"An' from there, you know the rest. We stayed on Artemis a while, moved here to Hillys. Had a pretty good time of it really, until the DomZ showed up again, bringin' those stinkin' Alphas with 'em."

Pey'j sat down wearily, every line of his body screaming exhaustion. "So there it is. You're my little girl. You're also a few other things, an' the key to an intergalactic conflict just happens to be one of your fancier hats."

Jade sat mutely, her mouth slightly agape. She turned the picture frame in her hands, and stared at it with dull, unblinking eyes. "I think..." she began softly, "I think I need a second alone, now."

With that, she set the picture down with careful precision and walked slowly out of the room. Pey'j and Hub met one another's eyes, and in tacit agreement they let her go.

"How many people know about this?" Hub asked suddenly, his voice strained.

"Me," said Pay'j, "You. The member of the Order I report to. Anyone he's told. An' anyone with half a brain who saw her little show up on Selene," he finished, his voice seeded with both affection and bitterness.

"The DomZ will be coming. Soon, and in greater force," Hub stated. He folded his hands behind his back and straightened to attention. "We must evacuate her from the planet immediately!"

Pey'j snorted. "Well thank pig heaven that somone thought o' that," he snapped. "I've only been tryin' to arrange an escort since we got back from Selene, is all. But y'know, I'm not a hunnert percent sure that the Order wants to save her. I think they may just be plannin' to transfer the Essence an' hell with what it'll do to her. She's too visible now, y'see, an' they don't trust me to be emotionally impartial, not what I don't see their point, but..." he set down the crescent wrench he had been fiddling with and straightened his age- and weight-bent back, met Hub's eyes directly, and spoke every syllable precisely: "But if they try anythin' of the sort, they are goin' to have to come through me."


End file.
